The Last Monsters
by ShadowCookies
Summary: A spinoff of post-pacifist Undertale from a compound lens of sci-fi and crime drama. I'm not sure what I was thinking either.
1. Telescope

Note:

There's some violence, graphic details, potentially uncomfortable situations, and other stuff.

That should do it.

* * *

 _In a distant taiga, there once lived a tribe of humans and a tribe of monsters._

 _On the surface, the humans lived in a walled town dotted with several tall buildings. Few traders ever visited, so the humans grew their own crops and built their own industries. They were a particularly hardworking bunch, having mastered the precursors to concrete and steel._

 _Nearby was a village populated by magical monsters of all shapes and sizes. The monsters rarely visited the humans; therefore, they became equally self-sufficient. Unlike the humans, however, the monsters opted to study and develop advances in the magical arts instead of the industrial field. This choice was a trade-off at the cost of technology, and the village's stone-brick houses were nowhere near as impressive as their human counterparts. The monsters were ruled by the Dreemurrs, a long-standing family of two-legged, two-armed goat-like monsters. Each king and queen successively brought prosperity to the monsters through their benevolent rule._

 _It seemed peace was not meant to last. Disagreements became scuffles, then bouts; as the pressure kept building, violence between the twin civilizations spiraled into full-scale war. Bitter fighting erupted in five or six places and spread like multiple wildfires, with dozens to hundreds of new settlements being sucked into the bloody vortex every day. To unify and maintain communications between the different tribes of monsters around the world, the Dreemurrs played host to a conference of delegates from every monster society in their own home village._

 _It was not long before the humans discovered their opportunity to remove the entire enemy high command at once. From their walled town, they launched a surprise attack and began slaughtering everything that moved. The crimson rivers only stopped flowing when the humans, decisively victorious over the monsters, cornered and sealed the last group of survivors underground to be imprisoned for all eternity. Without their leaders, the other monster villages collapsed within a few decades._

 _Many years later, an orphaned human child fell into the monsters' underworld and found their way to the Dreemurrs' front door. No monster expected a human to visit so abruptly, if at all, but they must had noticed something unique regarding the child. The Dreemurrs decided to adopt the human child as their own, and almost instantaneously, the human child and the Dreemurrs' son became best friends._

 _They shared butterscotch-cinnamon pie. They played "Monsters and Humans," although the human child always liked to be the monster. They helped the king take care of his garden of golden flowers._

 _Unfortunately, the human child grew ill one day. She was severely poisoned, and the monsters lacked the modern medicine to cure her. With her dying words, the human child asked the Dreemurr prince to take them back to the human village._

 _When the prince entered the village with the child's body, the humans thought he had killed the child. Before the prince could explain himself, the humans attacked him._

 _Against all odds, the prince survived his vicious beating and was reunited with his family; soon after, his friend and sibling recovered from her buttercup poisoning and everything was as it was before. The barrier remained standing, but at least they were safe underground for the time being._

* * *

"That's our history with Mount Ebott in a nutshell."

Between Mars and Jupiter orbited 'Planet' ZY-9, an asteroid-sized space station populated by a group of vaguely humanoid figures. From the outside, ZY-9 looked like any other of the trillion asteroids orbiting the Sun—bland, dull, but still majestic as a team of ice skaters locked in an eternal dance. However, the inside was a bustling metropolis, featuring dozens of chrome-plated compounds, a beehive of flying shuttles, and acres of hydroponic gardens. Large cargo ships docked and departed continuously, supplying the station with raw materials harvested from the far corners of the galaxy. Smells of disinfectants choked the air, but the crisp aroma of freshly baked goods offered relief from the harsh chemical cleaners. There was no shortage of defense systems, as anti-spacecraft batteries and hangers dotted the outskirts of the station.

A few hundred figures in everything from run-of-the-mill clothes to full power armor were assembled in one of the hangars, listening intently to a robed and hooded figure behind a podium. Neat rows of dark banners, each decorated with a shield insignia with one large purple star in the middle, hung from the curved roof and flapped lazily in the artificially heated air.

The speaker was wrapping up an emphatic discussion about recent events that occurred on Earth, gesturing at holographic depictions of the historic violence that consumed the mountain range. One slide showed a group of humans burning down a house with monsters still in it. Another showed a human chasing a child monster while waving a spear over his head. Agitated murmurs began rippling through the audience. The speaker raised a paw, shushing the crowd, and spoke of the need to prevent further atrocities from taking place. Looking into the audience, they suggested deploying several "agents" to the range.

"In conclusion, the circumstances of the region surrounding Mount Ebott deserve particular attention. Although the great war between the monsters and the humans has largely subsided, the atmosphere is still too unstable to leave alone. Furthermore, we have intelligence that the barrier that once imprisoned the monsters has been shattered. This barrier was no ordinary magical shield; it would have taken an immense amount of power to break it. We must discover every detail behind how this happened."

One of the agents, dressed in a form-fitting, leather-like outfit and a red scarf instead of a proper set of armor, called attention to himself and announced, "I have years of experience conducting operations on Earth. All were largely successful, and I don't plan on failing my people now."

The speaker removed their hood to reveal a familiar face: one which had two short horns poking out just behind their forehead, long, droopy ears that were rounded at their ends, and a healthy coat of whitish fur. With a hardly worried smirk, they asked if the agent was truly prepared for this mission.

The agent scratched his own floppy ears, smiled, and insisted, "I may be young, but I have the record and skill to get the job done."

"That settles today's briefing, then. Meeting adjourned!"

The agent thought to himself about his word choice as he walked away from the rapidly dispersing crowd.

"I am a person," he thought. "That's what my race refers to itself as. We aren't 'space aliens' or 'monsters;' we're just… a bunch of creatures with the strength to survive this long and the intelligence to thrive while doing it. We aren't 'human' people though. We're people, but we aren't hairless chimps from the planet Earth. Some other civilizations have difficulty understanding this, so they rather lovingly called us angels and demons and everything in between."

The agent chuckled to himself about nicknames, and then inspected the polished hangar he and his colleagues stood in. Simply "surviving" may have been an understatement. Everywhere he looked, neat rows of spaceships stood at attention. Some were larger and designed to carry dozens while others were smaller and served as two-person starfighters. All the ships bore the same motif as the banners overhead.

"The shock and awe isn't completely misplaced; we've _built_ thousands of artificial worlds to complete a truly impressive galaxy-spanning network," the agent considered silently, "The name makes us feel proud of our technological achievements, so I guess it's fitting. Technology isn't everything, though. We've been able to harness magic for as long as the stars have shined."

The agent stopped to help a bunch of workers telekinetically lift one end of a starfighter by an arm's length, allowing one of the other creatures to reach a tricky spot in the fuselage with a rag.

Continuing his mental monologue, he explained, "Not even the strongest of us run around destroying worlds, but they're quick and clever and generally not fun to be caught in a fight with. I don't even bother with armor anymore because that kind of equipment would just slow me down. Needless to say, the magically adept are a prime choice for _dirty work_. Case in point: the M.B., an…intragalactic detective agency of sorts."

As the agent approached his starfighter, a mechanical voice crackled to life, declaring, "Greetings, Agent. I will be your A.I. assistant for this M.B. assignment. You are to fly this vehicle to Earth and investigate any traces of the barrier near Mount Ebott."

The voice read a pre-flight checklist aloud. Meanwhile, the agent strapped himself into the pilot's seat and made himself comfortable. He began to adjust a few of the hundreds of glowing switches and dials that lined the cockpit.

"Fusion engine: on. Life support systems: active. Wormhole generator: stable. Plasma cannons: armed. Preparing for takeoff."

The agent felt a virtual eye-roll as the A.I. announced, "Oh, and that coffee machine you installed next to the filing cabinet you also installed is done making your latte."

"You know I'd make one for you, but…anyway, how's the stealth field doing?"

"Stealth systems nominal. Human optics and scanners will not identify this spacecraft as anything more than an errant radio wave."

A starfighter rocketed away from Planet ZY-9 at leisurely few thousand kilometers per hour, headed straight into the asteroid field. Earth looked no larger than a tiny blue speck on the vessel's HUD.

* * *

*Before you make the wormhole jump to Earth, HQ has requested that you investigate an unusual object they detected near the station, which is probably a rock like it always is. Anyway, I'm sure you'll be able to find out which rock you're looking for out of the infinity billion around here.

"Play nice. They found an unidentified spacecraft last time and for all we know, we could bump into another one. We picked up an electromagnetic signature from this one, so it has to be something interesting."

*No, that was a hunk-of-junk satellite from Earth. It had this strange golden plate with flimsy doodles etched on it for some reason they didn't understand, so they sent it on its merry way straight out of this star system.

* * *

Elaborating further on the A.I.'s first mission statement, the pilot described, "This barrier's been a thorn in our side for years now, and if someone managed to get rid of it before we could; well, that's someone we'd take great interest in meeting."

The agent considered his reasons for volunteering so readily, thinking, "I know I volunteered to go to Earth, but to be honest, I find Earth rather unflattering. I know a good bit of the history; the culture, too, and I've even met a few humans all for the sake of work, but…looking like what we look like…when it gets dirty, it gets _really_ dirty."

The asteroid field, unusually dense around ZY-9 as if to form a defensive shell game, showed no signs of thinning out enough for a safe wormhole jump. Even at the fighter craft's top speed, it would still be a slow, gradual trek through the rocks. Remembering something, the agent relaxed into his pilot's seat and took a sip from his drink.


	2. Encounter

_Six agents and one particularly adorned commander sat, bored half to sleep, in one side of a carrier ship's cargo bay. On the other side was a group of creatures in lab coats enthusiastically discussing their findings among themselves._

 _"So, that's 200 mg Ranunculus allenii, 500 mg sulphureus, 375 mg glacialis, and 1800 mg acris. These will make excellent samples when we return home."_

 _"Excuse me, doctors…"_

 _"Yes?"_

 _"When we were told to accompany you on a 'safari', I didn't think that meant watching you lot pick flowers all day! How did we even end up agreeing to this?"_

 _"We borrowed some of you Bureau types for protection from the local wildlife and such. Even if botany isn't your cup of tea, you must admit that this is a rather breathtaking planet._ _Our route takes us past a mountain range, and I hear this one's inhabited by real, live humans and monsters! Don't you want to see some?"_

 _"No. Yes. Fine, whatever."_

 _As the carrier ship approached Mount Ebott, the human settlement came into view. A series of concrete buildings formed a circle around a hill, which was covered in golden flowers. Around the buildings were smaller houses and shops, while a square stone wall encompassed the entire town. On the hill, all the resident humans were gathered around something and running that something through the gauntlet._ _One agent winced at the gruesome display and shouted, "Sir, that something's a goat monster! They're really killing 'em down there!"_

 _"Goat…monster…?"_

 _The commander stared at his colleague. His horned, clawed, salad-loving, at-times-stubborn colleague._

 _"We need to help. HQ will understand our unauthorized actions. You plant lovers can wait up here; everyone else, to arms!"_

 _The commander opened a black vortex with a snap of the fingers and jumped in, motioning for the other agents to follow him. At the hill's edge, the other end of the wormhole appeared with a loud whoosh and spat out the landing party one by one. Spacetime tunnel rapidly shrinking out of existence, he announced, "Step away from the monster!"_

 _Three agents immediately scaled the hill, bare feet leaving muffled footsteps in the grass. Gleaming silver, two-pronged spears in their paws, they positioned themselves between the monster and the humans and stood ready to skewer anybody who stepped too close. The others, unarmed only in appearances, silently prepared their signature magic attacks and waited for the first shot to ring out._

 _"Step back! Now!" they yelled._

 _Every human backed away from the fallen monster as the rest of the invaders shoved their way uphill. The commander walked toward the crumpled heap of fluff and checked its neck for a pulse. Meanwhile, another agent conducted various tests for vital signs. The monster's body was in a terrible state—ears hanging by threads, fur pulled out in bloody clumps, and everything else far too broken for any healing magic to be effective._

* * *

Monster HP: 740/10,000

*Comparing against default templates…

*Multiple complete bone fractures and a gunshot wound to the lower right leg.

*Widespread tissue trauma and internal bleeding.

Human HP: 5/44 (PSN)

*Acute _Ranunculus_ poisoning.

* * *

 _"Sir, are we sure that this is one of the monsters? He kind of looks like one of us if we were seven years old or so. And the other one—only five HP? We can't ever get there fast enough, can we?"_

 _The acting commander looked even more surprised at the resemblance, but mentally pushed that aside and nodded and told the other agents, "This is definitely not one of our scouts. I admit that the resemblance is quite strange, but we can worry about that later. If he holds up against bullets about as well as we do, then he's barely clinging to life. As for the child with the monster, I need a vial of, let's see here… 'anti-protoanemonin'? Am I pronouncing that right? Two HP scales for two different SOUL types, but no matter how you look at it, we need to treat both of them immediately."_

 _"And what about their SOULs?"_

 _The white heart lying on the monster's chest was cracked like a spider web and glowing weakly; the red heart lying next to it was equally damaged._

 _"Healing magic for their SOULs, medicines for their bodies. With two angles of attack they'll have that much better of a chance. Now get the medics over here already; they don't have all day and neither do we."_

 _Another wormhole from the carrier ship appeared, dropping off several more invaders in lab coats and stethoscopes and enough shiny tools to fill an operating room. The humans didn't seem to like the impromptu hospital being built in front of them, and murmurs began to flow through the crowd._

 _"Who are these guys? Did they come from the mountain?"_

 _"No, don't you see? They're probably that monster's friends coming to rescue it! They must have figured out how to get around that barrier!"_

 _"That monster's going to come after us again if it survives."_

 _One of the village guards stepped forward, shouting, "Just let that thing die already!" At the same time, he aimed a pistol at the dying monster. In a hair of a second, the commander looked up, snapped his fingers, and reappeared in front of the wounded prince with arms outstretched, offering himself to the bullets in a bizarre voluntary human shield maneuver._

 _Foolish or brave, it was something he did almost reflexively. One second, his ears twitched from the hostility in the guard's voice, and the next, his SOUL and body had cooperated to place him directly in harm's way. A mixture of anger and disbelief starting to cloud his common sense, he tried to say something but only managed to growl, under his breath, "You're…aiming…at…a child…you…vile…"_

 _The guard's fingers tensed around the trigger, but he felt his grip faltering under the commander's unwavering, toothy stance. The commander noticed the human hand loosening its grasp—an opening lasting just a hair of a second—and with another snap, he blasted the gun out of the hostile's hands and onto the grass. He surveyed the steel weapon, looked up at the guard's face, looked at the gun again, and then glared at the other humans. Most of the men and women were about five centimeters or so taller than him—his gaze was raised at a slight angle to meet their eyes—but their eyes were fixated on a small black vortex hovering just above his right shoulder._

 _"Look out!"_

 _The vortex pulsed and launched another concussive purple blast into the guard's chest. The magical impact sent the guard flying backward, leaving him struggling to pick himself up from the grass._

 _"If this attack becomes a murder_ — _if that kid doesn't pull through, monsters will be the least of your fears. And you…try that gun again and you'll end up halfway through the nearest building."_

 _The humans took the hint, lingering around like moths around a lamp but otherwise allowing the medical team to work unimpeded. Continuing through the sunset, the doctors patched broken bones, reconstructed bruised tissue, and closed open wounds. Much to their relief, the monster's cracked SOUL began to pulse weakly with vitality. Another doctor injected the human child with the antitoxin, and the child's tense body seemed to relax its pain away._

 _"Good work. Now, let's board the Carrier and get out of here."_

 _One of the agents began to wave towards the now-moonlit sky, only for the commander to grab their arm and stop them._

 _"No. Those two are in no condition to take the wormhole and we can't land the ship without all the humans seeing it. We'll just have to walk to Mount Ebott ourselves."_

 _As the agents departed north for the monster village with the two injured children, the commander noticed that a horde of humans had been stalking roughly a kilometer behind and closing in quickly. Perhaps there was an element of curiosity driving them along, but those humans were intent on stopping the injured monster from escaping to safety even if it meant risking their lives to pursue them into monster territory. When the agents turned around, they locked eyes with the humans and everyone froze where they stood for an odd moment._

 _The invaders with spears did a little flourish with their weapons, tips glowing a faint white as magical energy swirled into the gap between their prongs. The commander summoned another black vortex above his paw. Unlike the wormholes, this one visibly warped the space around it, creating a blurry sphere of gravitational distortions in the air beside him._

 _"Return to your homes now. This one won't be a warning shot."_

 _Tensions boiled hotter with each agonizingly slow second, but still the pursuers refused to back down. They were twice as close now as they were when first spotted and getting closer every second._

 _One of the agents grabbed the commander by the shoulder and whispered into his fur-covered ear, "Sir! Can't we scare them off instead of killing them?"_

 _"Look at them. Look at their sweaters and matching lockets and the peaceful way they rest. Do you honestly believe that people who felt no hesitation in beating them to death can just be 'scared away'? Those people you're suddenly so fond of are our enemies."_

 _"No. This isn't our fight. Our role was to rescue the young ones and nothing more. It would be unwise to get much more involved in this. Let us escape now, and if they're truly our enemies, we'll be hearing from them again soon."_

 _Spending hours watching them recover had calmed him, and he acquiesced and signaled. As the crowd drew still closer, all of the agents dropped their spears, kneeled, and dug their paws into the earth. One by one, they closed their eyes and glowing, white hearts began to shine through the night sky like fireflies. The plains bordering the mountain range fell completely silent, and after three seconds, one of the agents whispered something. Soil and air alike began to grow warmer, building up like a convection oven until suddenly, a trail of flames tore through the ground and cut off the pursuers. Now face-to-face with a two-meter firewall, the villagers had no recourse beyond turning back._

 _"Nicely done. The magic will wear off by morning. Now, let's get them home."_

 _The landing party approached a forest and discovered a cleared path leading counterclockwise around Mount Ebott's eastern face. Upward hiked the leader with one child in his arms and the other cradled beside him by the air itself, following a trail of fresh paw-prints leading away from a cave at the end of the path. He tried to explore the cave, but there was a crystalline blockade of vibrating energy sealing the passage a short way away from the entrance. He stopped and tried to push his way through the ethereal bubble, but it resisted with the force of a solid steel block. After a few minutes spent trying to figure out a way to crack the barrier, two goat monsters appeared from the unlit interior of the cavern and approached him._

 _"Our children! You've found them! We were so worried! Are...are they okay?"_

 _One of the agents mouthed "Children? Plural?" to another. The other silently shrugged and nodded._

 _"I'm sorry, but they were attacked by the humans. We did all we could to save them, and the good news is that they will survive."_

 _The leader carefully handed the two children through the barrier. Their parents broke into tears, but it was very obvious that their children were lucky to be alive._

 _"Now stand back. We're going to get rid of this barrier for you."_

 _The king and queen nodded and stumbled backward with their children, watching as their visitor stepped back and retrieved a spear from his colleagues. He raised it at the barrier, grasped it tightly until it glowed as it did back in the village, and stabbed forward in a single swift motion. The metal violently collided against an unseen force, filling the entrance of the cavern with sparks._

 _"Did it work?"_

 _The commander reached for the royal family, but his paw was stopped in midair. The barrier was still there._

 _"Do it again!"_

 _Several of the agents raised their own spears to no avail. Under increasingly frustrated orders of "Again!", the visitors thrust and swung and hacked at the barrier, rippling the bubble with every impact. When they ran out of unbroken lances, they switched to hurling all manner of magical projectiles at the resisting blockade, but none were strong enough to overcome it. Not even a combined attack of the same magnitude as the line of fire seemed to leave much of a dent._

 _"We...we can't do it. Why can't we do it?"_

 _"We will be fine. Our children will clearly need time to recover, anyway. In any event, we thank you from the bottom of our hearts."_

 _"Happy to be of service. Now, we wanted to monitor their condition over the next few days, but this force field…complicates things. With that in mind, the doctors wanted me to tell you some things."_

 _"'Things'? Will…will they be okay?"_

 _"Yes, thankfully, it's not those kinds of things. Even though the white one got beaten the worst, he should be able to strut around comfortably within a week. The hairless one only suffered a few bumps and bruises on the outside, but she was poisoned. We gave her a dehydrating agent to, um…'dimerize the protoanemonin'?"_

 _One of the more chemically proficient figures nodded and added, "In layman's terms, the poison was converted into a form her body can process. It may take about ten days to pass all of it, and in the meantime, she will feel very tired and thirsty. Plenty of bed rest and fluids as usual."_

 _"If only we could handle this barrier…I know what happened between your people and the humans. I know how they slaughtered your kind by the thousands and created this prison, but we don't know how to break down its walls. I'm so, so sorry that all of this had to happen to you, but I swear that we'll bring this prison down somehow and let you go free. I promise we'll be back. Please, just stay determined!"_

* * *

"I felt so powerless on that day, having to tell the monsters that there was nothing we could do for them. The next best thing was to confront the humans, of course, but when we got another team on the ground, they reacted with hunting bows and rifles and one of us took a bullet right in the head."

Unconsciously, the pilot touched his own head just beside his right ear.

"How could I have been so naive...so...so _careless_? They nearly died from that one gunshot alone. For all the incredible things we could do, we never thought our lives could end so quickly; that a well-placed blow was all it took. We had no choice but to get our comrade to safety, but that was the final straw for us. Even though our scouts reported that the common threat of the monsters was enough to get all of humanity to put aside their differences and join under a _United Earth Government._ Even though that in itself was an astonishing achievement for democracy and equality even on a galactic scale. We've tried to hide our involvement on Earth for as long as we could, but that incident showed us just how great of a threat we were facing. They had to pay for their long overdue crimes."

The M.B. called upon the regulars to subdue the village once and for all, but many of the soldiers seemed entirely too eager to begin what amounted to an invasion of Earth. Word spread so quickly that the agents passed a fleet of battle-cruisers headed for Earth before they even reached the asteroid station themselves. Everyone back at ZY-9 had dropped everything and gathered around public plazas, waiting for the first bomb with the same enthusiasm as if it was the first point of a championship game.

"To be honest," the pilot continued rather callously, "I didn't care much if we orbitally bombed the humans, but the M.B. couldn't condone that level of widespread violence because those monsters could have taken collateral damage. Instead, they signaled the warships and devised a plan to relocate the humans who lived near Mount Ebott and create a spatial buffer between the monsters and any humans who might bother them."

The pilot took a sip, activated a touch-screen interface for the vessel's computer, and sorted through several charts marked with red, jagged lines.

"They fabricated seismic readings and planted stories in their news channels, and pulled dozens of strings to convince humanity that a massive geological event was about to strike the mountain. The humans evacuated in preparation for the 'earthquake,' and the day after the last family packed their bags, a cloaked battleship entered a geostationary orbit and approached Mount Ebott."

With a wave of the paw, the seismic charts flew off-screen like hockey pucks sliding across a frozen lake. The next image depicted a bundle of energized, blue wisps of gas tangled into a giant, flaming cotton ball.

"The combined magical power of thousands of crew members is to our little team attacks as our little team attacks are to a light breeze, and an unoccupied town meant no bystanders would be harmed. Leading the humans' town by a slight degree, the battleship fired a glowing ball of condensed energy from a hatch in its underside. The light bomb smashed into the town a second later and char-broiled it with a single explosion. The humans returned to see their village devastated beyond repair, so they turned their backs on Mount Ebott and never returned again."

"Only after a mini-invasion did the humans stop fighting, having run so far with their 'might makes right' ideology. When the dust settled, though, ground teams discovered that the potent magical barrier was still standing. We tried everything we could to break the barrier down yet again, but nothing we tried came close to even making a dent. It just sat there, mocking our technology and strength with its shimmering stubbornness. We were powerless to do anything but monitor the barrier from the outside and hope that the monsters inside would figure out how to remove it."

"And somehow, they did."

The agent instructed the A.I. to find relevant data.

* * *

Chara Dreemurr 99 AT 99 DF

*Earth human in a realm of monsters.

*LV 7.

*Suspected for role in breaking the barrier.

*Wanted for questioning.

* * *

The agent looked puzzled. Instead of printing a standard paper portfolio, the computer system projected a blue rectangular hologram a few feet from itself, occupying the middle with a full-body model of the child. On either side of the diagram were a series of lines connecting typed statistics and facts to various parts of the image.

"Agent," the A.I. explained, "as you remember, I will present information to you in this format for Earth missions only. This printout is how the monsters and humans of Earth perceive combat, which may be a useful tactical aid for your encounters. I will attempt to estimate the foe's attacking and defending skills as well as their LV, often confused with a kill-count but more accurately a measure of how easily someone will resort to violence. You may also see a description of the foe's SOUL. Observing the properties of a SOUL can give you valuable information about a foe's special abilities."

"Now let's find out just who you are, Chara Dreemurr."

The agent looked under his pilot's seat, searching for any notes he may have written previously about Earth. An alarm and a flashing warning light suddenly interrupted his search.

"Wait, what's that in the radar? Is it what HQ's looking for?" the pilot thought.

* * *

Asriel Dreemurr inf(AT, DF)

*"God of Hyperdeath."

*LV 4.

*Bipedal Nubian goat-like monster. May be one of yours, but then he'd be the only of your kind who can fly.

*Wearing a robe emblazoned with a shield and angel motif and a golden heart-shaped locket.

*Inverted white SOUL...Upright yellow SOUL...Upright green SOUL...Upright purple SOUL...

*Telepathic abilities detected.

*Distance to target: 27 km.

*Massive distortion in electromagnetic energy field detected. All controls are unresponsive.

* * *

This seven-SOULed creature was no asteroid and clearly not a spacecraft. Nearly choking on his drink as he frantically sat up straight in the cockpit, the agent pulled back as hard as he could on the throttle.


	3. Howdy!

The collision sent shock waves through the asteroid field, dislodging the smallest bodies from their orbits and sending them careening into neighboring planetoids like a planetary pinball game. A few high-energy impacts later, they settled into stable positions as if they were never disturbed.

Shrugging off his extremely personal meet-and-greet with the starfighter, Asriel tried to comprehend the previous five seconds. Something had just flown into him with the speed and force to knock a building into orbit.

(Wait…was that a spaceship?)

Asriel glanced at the smoke coming from below him. The ashy cloud didn't spread as far as he thought it would; instead, most of it lingered around that one spot on the rocks like some sort of dark mist. Any trails that did make their way to the prince's nose choked of burnt charcoal and iron filings.

(It looks like it crashed on that asteroid below me...)

Asriel floated to the nearby asteroid, checking for signs of a wrecked spaceship. Among the dull, rocky surface, bits of metal sparkled like stars. The metal formed a long trail that, like breadcrumbs in a forest, pointed to the ship's pilot. Much to the 'god's disbelief, the traveler was not only alive, but stumbling out of the veil on his two feet as if he had merely ridden a roller coaster too many times. A few meters to his left was what appeared to be the remains of the cockpit, automatically ejected from the spacecraft just before the accident.

* * *

Pilot ? AT ? DF

*Whitish, upside-down SOUL. Looks a lot like a Boss Monster.

*LV ?

*Telepathic abilities.

*Has items:

*Two-pointed spear. Doesn't seem very practical for jabbing.

*Red scarf. Made of a mundane fabric, but projecting a dense magical shield around the pilot's head.

*Oxygen bubble. (?)

*Radiant device. (?)

*Seems to be part of an emergency kit.

*You tried to read his thoughts more clearly, but everything else is being telepathically blocked.

* * *

After being attacked by someone with a concealed pistol, the prince would never again make the mistake of overlooking inventory details. It helped him gain an idea of people's intentions without a single spoken word thus far, but this time poking around only served to confuse him. To say Asriel looked surprised by the unusual characteristics of the items he noticed would be a gross understatement.

(This technology is futuristic compared to even the humans'. I can get a little information from the pilot's thoughts, but I don't understand more than the basic stuff. As for the SOUL, I think Mom said that all monsters have upside-down hearts.)

After sneaking a look at his own SOUL, the prince surveyed the unknown pilot more closely.

* * *

Pilot HP: 275,000

*Looks dazed.

* * *

"Hey," Asriel shouted telepathically, "you nearly took my head off with your metal death trap! What are you even doing here?"

It surprised him a little when specific words and a voice began to arrange themselves in his head.

"I'm very, very sorry. I really didn't mean to run someone over today, and certainly not in the Asteroid Belt," the agent responded, sheepish expression as though he had been caught with a cookie in his mouth and both paws rummaging inside the jar.

"Are you okay?"

(He can talk! And it's in a language we speak! So that must mean…)

"I'm fine, " Asriel replied, "but you really shouldn't try to decapitate your king's son."

(Not if you want to keep your SOUL anyway…)

The agent was still disoriented from the crash. He noticed the wreck of his starfighter in a distant crater, and in the meantime, his newfound companion and sort-of-doppelganger continued to hover impatiently above the asteroid.

In a confused voice, he asked, "King? Son? Prince? What?"

Asriel looked at the agent as if the agent had lost his mind. In this moment, that assumption was not far from the truth.

"Come on, " Asriel explained, "what kind of monster doesn't recognize Asriel Dreemurr: King Asgore and Queen Toriel's son and all-around coolest Boss Monster in the Underground?"

"So clearly you aren't one of ours," the agent answered. "Wait, 'my king's son?' What makes you think I'm from your kingdom anyway?"

The agent thought intensely about the names he heard, swearing to himself that he had heard them before. A memory began to surface, but the effects of the crash jarred the agent's thoughts.

"Your upside-down SOUL," Asriel explained, "and you look like a Boss Monster yourself."

"All of my kind have upside-down SOULs," the agent clarified. "It seems only… _humans_ …have upright SOULs."

* * *

Asriel Dreemurr HP: 1,000,000

*That expression on your face when you mentioned "humans" intrigues Asriel.

* * *

"Do you have something against humans?"

"It's a long story with little in the department of satisfying details. I keep to myself, they keep to themselves, and on good days nobody gets hurt. So, what, is your Highness some sort of traveling human rights activist? Aren't your loyalties a little misplaced there?"

It wasn't the prince's place to speak for all humans, but he kept a certain few in a place near his heart.

"But the two I live with would never hurt anybody. Maybe you were just unlucky and you ran into some of the bad ones."

The agent forced his mind to start working again and pondered the name "Asriel Dreemurr" for a minute. It didn't take much to piece all the information together; all of a sudden, his demeanor lightened and his face shifted into a curious expression.

(Wait…why is he looking at me like that? Did I say something?)

"How old did you say you were again?"

"What?"

"Um…never mind."

The agent straightened himself, brushing off charred bits of metal. He reached inside his outfit and pulled out a holographic badge with the M.B. insignia on it.

"Nevertheless," he cautiously approached, "I'm looking for a 'Chara Dreemurr' for the Morality Bureau's sake. There's been some…'disturbing events' recently. I'm guessing that you know her."

Asriel looked concerned.

"Disturbing events?" Asriel thought. "But Chara came to her senses before the unthinkable happened. We all forgave her because she tried her best to fix her mistakes, so why is this guy poking around now?"

"I know Chara," Asriel declared cautiously.

"So, if you could come with me to Chara's residence, then—"

"You're holding a spear."

"I realize that, but it's a necessary self-defense procedure to carry—"

"If you aren't going to hurt Chara, then you wouldn't have brought weapons."

Asriel glared at the agent's paw casually resting on the weapon's polished shaft.

Exasperated, the agent said, "I'm not going to harm Chara unless I have no other choice. Trust me, the M.B. prides itself on peaceful resolutions. Please don't make this harder than it has to be."

The agent murmured something. Asriel tensed at the possibility of an incoming attack, but the incantation didn't seem to be aimed at him. A faint green light glowed in the pilot's paw and then disappeared. Asriel assumed a fighting stance, and declared, "You're not going anywhere near Chara no matter what you say your intentions are. Violence, nonviolence, I don't care. I made the mistake of trusting someone who said they wouldn't hurt me and my friend and it isn't going to happen again."


	4. Memory

Pilot HP: 275,000

*Isn't leaving until he sees Chara.

*Convince him otherwise.

* * *

The agent clutched his head as a familiar human village whirled into view, memory projected by his opponent's telepathic skill.

* * *

 _I nearly lost Chara once. She accidentally ate some buttercups that grew around the Underground and became really sick. We tried to do everything to cure her, but…the blisters…the blood…the tears…it was just too much. Chara knew it in the back of her mind; she told me to absorb her SOUL to make sure it wouldn't shatter if her body couldn't hold on. Then, 'we' went to find a human doctor and have them cure Chara's body. She would be okay, I would put her SOUL back, it would be like nothing ever happened, and everything could go back to normal. I carried her to the village gate and started talking to the humans there._

 _"Could any of you please help my friend? She's really sick and I don't know what to do."_

 _"Jumping Jesus on a Pogo Stick, it's a talking goat! And what happened to her?"_

 _"A doctor! Please, she needs to see a doctor!"_

 _The gatekeeper was afraid of letting a monster into the village, but I talked them into lowering their weapons and letting me in. I walked around for a while, but Chara was getting really heavy and the humans kept giving me weird looks and kept whispering to each other._

 _I was just about ready to put down Chara's body on a pretty patch of flowers and keep looking for a doctor. I thought the humans would respect their own child enough to overlook me being a monster._

 _They didn't. In the corner of my eye, I saw a glint of metal as one of the guards reached for something._

 _My ears exploded. I felt a sharp pain in the back of my leg, and when I turned around, the guard had a strange smoking weapon aimed at my head. I tried to run, but…my knee…everything around it felt like it was on fire. My head was spinning in circles; my arms didn't know whether to rub at my leg until the burning went away or cover my ears until the ringing stopped. Even though my teeth were clenched, I tried to yell out for help as loud as I could._

 _The other humans came…they…hit me a lot. I heard my SOUL beginning to crack. I clung to Chara's body as hard as I could. I had to hold on...I have to...remember…for Chara's sake…_

 _"Chara...anyone...please..."_

 _"Hey! Azzy! It's me!"_

 _"Chara? But how..."_

 _"No time for that. You have to use your magic on them or they'll kill both of us!"_

 _"But...I...I don't...what if I hurt them?"_

 _"Can't you feel what they're doing to you? You don't have a choice here; fireball them!"_

 _"I...I can't...Why is this happening to us? I just want to go home!"_

 _"I don't want to die, Chara! Please, help me!"_

 _The burning stopped, but it got cold…really cold…I could hardly see or hear and I just felt so tired, like I hadn't slept in years. Maybe it was all just a bad dream, and if I just closed my eyes, we'd both wake up in our beds…_

* * *

Despite the natural coloration of the prince's hide, it was obvious that the blood had drained away from his face. His breathing was as erratic and labored as if he'd flown the light-minutes here by flapping his arms; still, he had survived the worst of the trauma and it was a price he would gladly pay to keep Chara safe.

* * *

 _But I woke up, my leg bandaged, Chara's body still beside me, in Dad's throne room. Dad told me that the whole thing was a trap all along, some monsters risked their lives to save me and Chara, and that those humans in the village betrayed my trust. Carrying us to our room and gently nuzzling my forehead, he told me it was an honest-to-goodness miracle we survived. After a few days, my leg had healed enough to walk again, and I went to go check on Chara in her bed._

 _"Chara? Are you awake?"_

 _She stirred from her sleep and responded with a groggy "...what?"_

 _"I'm really, really sorry I couldn't fight back, okay? I could have gotten both of us killed and I just...something really terrible could have happened and it's all my fault..."_

 _"I'm not mad, Azzy...if anything, I should be apologizing. It was a dumb plan from the beginning. I shouldn't have trusted those humans to not hurt you and I should have never told you to risk your life up there for me. You're my little baby bro, and I don't want to see anything like that happen to you again."_

 _Chara pushed herself up from the soft pillow and gave me a hug._

 _"Now let me go back to sleep, okay? I'm tired..."_

 _Seeing us like this was enough to make Dad declare a new war. Nobody could really do anything while we were still trapped underground, but eventually we learned about the first war that put us down here to begin with. It upset us so much to hear about all those monsters who gave their lives to hold off the humans._

 _I don't know if maybe we would have been better off knowing less history rather than more. Sometimes Chara would have terrible nightmares of the war—bad men storming into our house and taking Mom and Dad away, or maybe one of us getting badly hurt and the other unable to do anything. The worst left her crying in the darkness, and sometimes I would be the one who needed a few minutes in Chara's arms. They got less frequent after the first few weeks, but Chara changed after that. Whenever she talked about other humans in general, she had fewer and fewer nice things to say._

 _I still don't know if Chara truly started to hate humanity, but I understood how much of the world we couldn't enjoy underground. I dreamed that one day, I could play in the grass with Chara. I wanted to taste the fresh water from the stream that ran down the mountain. Most of all, I wanted to see the stars of a beautiful night sky. I read some books that washed up in the Dump saying how amazing they were, and all we had underground was a sparkly cave, which could never make up for it in a million years. But then the worst came._

 _"We can't turn to war as an answer for everything, Gorey!"_

 _"What choice do we have? You saw what those people did to our son! We have to make sure this doesn't ever happen again!"_

 _"Oh, so your plan is to stop the violence by starting it ourselves?"_

 _"Fine, Tori, what do you want?"_

 _"I want to live in a world where our children don't have to watch us march off with bloody spears in our hands!"_

 _"...Mom? Dad? Is everything okay?"_

 _"Asriel! Um...We're just talking about adult stuff. Yes, that's correct, things you would not care much for anyway. Why don't you go and see if Chara wants to play?"_

 _Mom wasn't fooling me. I knew what they were arguing about, and everything clearly wasn't okay. After a few more days of shouting, Mom moved out and started living in the Ruins. Said she needed time to 'think things through for herself'. Those humans already took a childhood in the sun away from me, and now, somehow, they managed to take Mom away!_

 _Maybe Chara was right after all. I knew that Dad found six SOULs from the humans that fell into the Underground after the war because once I came home and they were all stacked up against a wall in New Home. Dad said they fell to their deaths while exploring the caves around Mount Ebott, and our only real option was to honor them as best as we could. They looked really creepy, just floating around in their canisters like bugs in amber, and I normally wouldn't have paid any more attention to them._

 _But one day, I was walking past the SOULs with Chara when I heard a voice coming from inside the purple SOUL's canister._

 _"Hey! You! You're the prince I've read about! Guys! Wake up! It's the prince!"_

 _The other five SOULs stirred and pressed eagerly against the glass._

 _"Be a dear and let us out of here, won't you?" asked the green SOUL._

 _"We've waited a long time for this," declared the light blue SOUL._

 _"Don't be afraid, we just want to talk to you," reassured the orange SOUL._

 _I let them out of their containers, and the SOULs started flying excitedly around the room before settling down in front of me. The dark blue SOUL began to, well, not exactly speak, but resonate with energy and send what it wanted to say right into my mind._

 _"The purple heart has told us about the history between the monsters and the humans. We knew that the humans had trapped you under the ground with a barrier, but we did not know all of the horrible things they did to you."_

 _"I can't believe they tried to kill you," said the green SOUL. "It's positively barbaric what they've done."_

 _"It just ain't right," announced the yellow SOUL, "and we'll help you settle the score."_

 _"Take our power, young one, and break this cursed barrier so that we may all go free," concluded the purple SOUL._

 _"Asriel."_

 _"Chara?"_

 _"I don't want to see you guys suffer anymore. We just need one more to have seven. If those random weirdos trust you, then borrow mine too and break the barrier."_

 _"But, Chara! You'll die if I take your SOUL!"_

 _"So, what? We were hardly living down here to begin with. I trust you, Azzy; all you have to do is take five seconds to break the barrier and then put my SOUL back before anything happens to my body. You were able to do it before, weren't you?"_

 _"But...but...I don't know if I can do this, Chara. Last time I had to do it to save your life, and you know I'd do anything for you, but I don't know these six people. What if I mess this up and something happens to them? What if they don't make it?"_

 _My paws were shaking. Chara grabbed me by my shoulders and told me, "Do you know how great it would be if we could pull this off? We'd be heroes, Azzy, and not only that, we'd make a lot of monsters' wishes come true at once. Could you imagine if we could bring Dad a golden flower from the surface to add to his garden? Could you imagine if Mom could open that school she's always dreamed of having? And what about the sentries, who haven't had a fresh bone to chew in ages? And what about Vulkin, who's always wanted to see a real volcano? I could go on and on, but my point is: I believe in you. We believe in you. I know you believe in me, but don't you believe in yourself?"_

 _I took a deep breath. The SOULs floated toward my own, and in an instant, I felt a vortex of magical energy. Something didn't seem right because I saw monster SOULs floating around me, too, but with seven human SOULs, I had power that gods could only dream of. First I tucked Chara's empty body in a corner for safekeeping, and I was just about to destroy the barrier and take my revenge on all of humanity, but then, I felt a strong concentration of determination behind me. Someone had the nerve to try and stop me, and that someone was another human child. I didn't know what to do, so I called upon the red SOUL for help._

 _"Chara! Now what?"_

 _"What do you think? It's a human! I told you before, Azzy, they deserve this!"_

 _"Galacta Blazing!"_

 _I launched a bunch of exploding stars at the human, but it was weird_ — _I could feel myself flying after them, but at the same time it felt like I wasn't doing that at all. Meanwhile, the human dodged and weaved; even though she had a toy knife, she didn't fight back._

 _"Shocker Breaker!"_

 _*SPARE_

 _"Hyper Goner!"_

 _I showed them the full force of my magic, but every time I struck her, that human's SOUL would rebound and re-fuse as if nothing happened. I kept fighting and fighting, but that human just refused to die. She just kept standing there and wouldn't even fight back no matter what I did. Even after I used my special attack, the human still had the strength to call out and save her friends. One by one, the monster SOULs left me._

 _Then, the human called out one last time, every last drop of her strength pouring into her voice._

 _"Asriel! Chara!"_

 _"What?! How do you know my name? And how do you know her name?"_

 _"I know what happened to you two. The war, the buttercups, the barrier—everything. I fell in here some time ago and your mom fixed up my leg and we shared some pie. I asked her how I could get back to the surface, and she didn't want me to leave the Ruins, but eventually she gave up and said I had to find King Asgore. Well, I did, and I met everyone along the way, and he still tried to whack me with his pitchfork, but then your mom sent him flying across the room with a fireball. I won't stop you if you want to destroy the barrier, but when you took all those SOULs...yes, your parents are in there, but they're my friends too. Every time you use their power to strike me...I...I can hear it...it's hurting them. Please, I don't want this to go on any longer!"_

 _I felt my stomach jump out of my body. One of the human SOULs started stirring inside me, and a voice started pleading to me._

 _"Asriel...this isn't you. The power's getting to your head. You don't have to do this for me anymore. Please listen to that human; I just want my brother back. We'll just have to find a different way to break the barrier, okay?"_

 _The human called my name next, and all the good memories I had with Chara started flooding back. I couldn't bring myself to fight anymore, and I could barely look at her after what I did. But even after all of that, she still forgave me for everything. I used the last of my power to destroy the barrier so that the human SOULs could go free, but they wouldn't leave me no matter how hard I tried to get them to go back to their families._

 _"Your Majesty, we've been away from our parents for years. Seeing us again after all that time would only tear open painful memories."_

 _"So instead, we're going to help you help the rest of the monsters. I know you won't let us down, kid."_

 _The nine of us, I guess, went back to the other monsters. I told my mom and dad the barrier was broken, and I was scared they'd start fighting again, but they were just happy to see that Chara and I were okay. The war Dad declared is still a touchy subject, but I think they set aside most of their differences so that we could have a family again._

* * *

There could be no other possibility. The agent recognized the third child as an unconscious, younger Chara, splayed out on the floor next to the dazed hero and a child Asriel stumbling in the general direction of his speechless parents.

(Come on, space goat…Chara wasn't a saint, but she doesn't deserve this!)

Doubt began to roll in like storm clouds. Perhaps she wasn't the best influence on the prince, but imagining Chara as a murderer became significantly more difficult after being shown Chara's role in saving both the monsters and the humans. The alien shuffled through his data again, carefully reading over what must have been a major misunderstanding from HQ.

But there was no time to sit around reading. Asriel chimed in patiently, "Those two believed in the goodness within me to the very end, even as I tried to kill one of them. Now you understand why I have to protect my friends, right?"


	5. Destiny

The agent opened his mouth to explain who Asriel's mystery saviors were but winced and clutched his own SOUL. He didn't want to return to that day either, but the memory must have been a hundred times more traumatic, and the pain a hundred times worse, for the victim himself. He was cognizant of the unneeded suffering his adamant prying just inflicted—a twinge of guilt began to appear under his disbelief.

* * *

Asriel Dreemurr HP: 1,000,000

*You are unaware of how stringent Earth monsters' combat training is.

*Expect Asriel to use deadly, imprecise force to protect Chara.

* * *

" _You_ broke the barrier? And those absorbed SOULs _helped you_?"

"Yep! It was all me; erm…'us', and not Chara's fault whatsoever! Means you can go away now, right?"

Even though that feat was something to be proud of in the invader's eyes, Asriel's confession sounded entirely too proud for the wrong reasons. As much as he wanted to leave the stargazer be, he had no choice but to press further.

"You don't seem to understand, " the agent said, "but as long as innocent lives are in danger, I owe it to them to investigate as thoroughly as possible. Maybe Chara didn't break the barrier, per se, but there's a whole lot of us concerned about how it ever got there. I still need answers. You're not going to stop me, so step out of the way."

"And you don't seem to understand that I'm not going to let anything happen to Chara, even if you say you won't hurt her," Asriel retorted.

"So be it."

The M.B. field officer raised the spear and twirled it above his head; then, he brought it to his shoulder and reared back. Asriel quickly flew aside to evade the incoming projectile, but, strangely, no such piercing attack ever flew past him. In fact, his opponent had backed away from tossing the weapon and was now holding it two-handed across his chest as if to guard himself. The prince returned a confused glare; the pilot seemed to be doing everything except attacking.

Perhaps he was lending the prince the small courtesy of attacking first.

"Chaos Blaster!" shouted Asriel.

The prince, still hovering about forty degrees above the asteroid, summoned a gleaming white shoulder-carried launcher and countered by rapid-firing a volley of white energy pellets and stars. The agent effortlessly dodged most of them, weaving and running and ducking around the stream of bullets.

"Hmph. After all those years, do you really miss me that much?"

The agent and Asriel "exchanged" fire for a few minutes, causing hundreds of stars to embed themselves into the rocky ground as absolutely zero counterattacks sailed off into space. The agent continued to block anything he couldn't dodge with the spear, while Asriel carpet-bombed all over the asteroid with blurring speed.

"Okay, that's enough. Last chance."

With a confident smile, the agent raised the spear again, tip now flaring like a lantern against a black backdrop. A white, fluid-like substance began collecting in between the prongs.

"This is only going to get more difficult as time goes on. Give up."

"Never!"

"Fine."

The agent aimed the prongs straight at Asriel's SOUL, shifted his fingers, and launched a single energy blast from the end of the spear. Asriel flinched and put up his arms to brace for the incoming impact, but it bounced harmlessly off his robe and disintegrated into white particles.

"Oh. You thought this was just a sharp stick, didn't you? Well, no matter…it clearly didn't work. Don't believe for a second that we're through though."

* * *

Asriel Dreemurr HP: 1,000,000

*Asriel is shaking his head tauntingly. Try a melee attack!

* * *

"I never liked using these things, anyway."

The agent threw the lance aside and materialized a sword with a black hilt and blade swirling with purple trails of energy. With a low-gravity leap, he bounded toward and swung at Asriel's chest.

"Chaos Saber!"

Summoning two white swords of his own, Asriel parried the strike.

(Let's see if being a royal prince helps with duels…)

Asriel dropped to the ground and swung high. The agent ducked.

(Take that!)

Asriel swung downward. The agent sidestepped.

(And that!)

Asriel swung low. The agent jumped back and softly landed a few feet away. No matter where or how quickly Asriel swung, his blades always seemed to land precisely where his opponent was a tenth of a second ago.

"Shocker Breaker!"

He sidestepped again, barely avoiding a column of lightning.

Asriel thrust a Chaos Saber directly at the agent's SOUL. Unable to predict the sudden forward strike, the agent blocked, wedging his sword against Asriel's. As both fighters struggled, he saw a glimpse of the wounded goat monster in Asriel's clenched face, causing him to lose his grip on his sword's handle. Asriel took the opportunity to knock the agent's sword out of reach, throwing the alien to the ground in the process. Asriel lunged at the agent and swung at his throat. The magical metal of the Chaos Saber collided violently against his scarf, sending sparks everywhere.

With a grabbing gesture, the agent indirectly and instantaneously recovered his sword, but also tugged at his scarf unconsciously. As the agent shifted the red fabric, Asriel noticed a fissure-like black mark running along the side of the agent's neck.

"A shield…I was wondering how he was still breathing without his ship," Asriel realized, "But what else is it covering?"

The alien held his celestial sword across his forehead with a two-handed grip and grinned.

"You've got quick feet and a strong heart, your Highness. I have no doubt you'll be able to carry the monsters back home on your shoulders one day. It's a real shame that we have to cross blades with each other, so I'm asking you again. Stop this. Just let me make sure that Chara isn't up to no good and we can both go home and enjoy a nice coffee."

"I'm sorry, but I have to protect my family. I'm not calling you a liar when you tell me you mean well, but you have to understand that it's hard for me to trust people who said they were trying to help."

"I think I'm starting to see the situation a little more clearly now. It's the humans, isn't it? That awful war has left you monsters and them afraid of each other. You're worried that no matter how many nice faces they put on, any outsiders want nothing but to hurt you. That's why you were trying to figure out what I had in my pockets earlier, wasn't it? Well? Am I right?"

Asriel said nothing, but clutched his swords closer to himself.

"Yeah, I knew you were poking around in my head. Didn't even try to hide your intrusions a little bit…but anyway, I'm about as much of an outsider as anyone can get. I admit that. But I really don't want to hurt anyone, Asriel. I'm not trying to start a war and I'm not in league with the humans. I mean, look at me. Do you know how hard it is for me to fight someone who might as well be my twin brother? Please listen to me. All I'm asking for is a little moment of trust and I'll never bother you or your family again."

* * *

Agent HP: 270,000

*Looks unfazed.

*You feel space-time itself beginning to distort around the alien.

* * *

"Galacta Blaz—"

Asriel was interrupted by a vague purple shape narrowly missing his head from the agent's direction, color pattern identical to the agent's sword's. When the prince followed the projectile's trajectory back to its thrower, he noticed that the alien seemed disappointed.

"Very well then. I hoped it wouldn't come to this, but you had better prepare yourself."

"Galac—"

A second projectile passed Asriel by a few inches.

"Maybe I shouldn't so rudely interrupt royalty," the alien muttered, sarcasm dripping from the last word. "Then again, the rocks you knocked me onto _hurt_ , so the kid gloves are off now, kid."

* * *

Agent HP: 270,000

*Will not wait for you to spell out your next attack.

*The real battle is beginning with or without you.

* * *

"Galacta Blazing!" shouted Asriel hastily.

Thousands of stars bombarded the agent, exploding into countless amounts of smaller stars. He sidestepped and teleported away from the bulk of the barrage, which flew harmlessly into space and faded harmlessly into the canopy of their twinkling celestial counterparts. However, he let his guard down too early and one errant star punched through the shield and scraped his cheek, leaving a red, smoking gash and sending a few drops of crimson liquid dripping onto the rock.

* * *

Asriel Dreemurr HP: 1,000,000

*Luckily, an A.I. does not feel pain.

*You, however, look like you could use a bandage.

* * *

As the agent's furry paws began to glow a bright shade of royal purple, a small black vortex appeared in front of his head, made a few smooth orbits, and settled an ear's length from his right ear. He pushed forward with his right paw, as if directing the orb to attack, and from the depths of the sphere flew a teardrop-shaped mass of faintly purple energy. Asriel was struck center mass with the projectile; still he showed no visible signs of damage but unlike the inconsequential spear's blast, the dark flare had caused him to recoil slightly.

"Ouch!"

"This is what you Earthlings would refer to as a 'magic attack.' Someone with my kind of job gets a lot of practice with these."

As purple sparks flew from the agent's paw, the vortex launched a larger flare toward Asriel's face, engulfing him in a cloud of pure energy. When the dust settled, the prince was rubbing his eyes without the slightest sign of discomfort anywhere else along his body. Unfortunately for him, the attack seemed to do nothing that a pepper shaker couldn't accomplish. He understood the ramifications of fighting an opponent with a DF rating high enough to overload the A.I.'s scanner, but more importantly, it was obvious that the agent could not muster the resolve to hurt Asriel. However, Asriel seemed to be hiding signs of restraint as well. If this monster had the nerve to dub himself the 'God of Hyperdeath,' then he should have been able to do far worse than a scrape across the cheek.

"Don't you realize that you're wasting your time?" Asriel questioned. "You'll never defeat me for as long as I care for Chara, and I'll slowly wear you down."

The two exchanged a few more volleys of bolts, rainbows, and stars. True to Asriel's prediction, the attacks continued to wear away hundreds of HP while Asriel suffered little damage in return.

Visibly annoyed, the alien replied, "That barrier was, is, and will be the greatest threat the universe will ever throw at us. For as long as there is a possibility that someone's life is in danger, I'll never give up. I owe it to civilization itself to leave no stone turned and no lead unchecked, if it means that an innocent life can be saved in the end."

"Enough messing around. If I can't convince you to leave peacefully, then it's time to end this," Asriel declared triumphantly.

(Frisk, I know you can't hear me from here, but I'm sorry. You went so far to make sure I wouldn't hurt anyone, but I have to do this to protect you and Chara.)

The agent noticed a surge of magical power welling up inside Asriel.

"Hyper Goner!"

A pulse resonated from the prince's heart, rumbling through the rock as a twenty-foot goat's skull appeared in front of Asriel. Both Asriel and the skull opened their mouths and let out an echoing, demonic laugh. The skull opened its mouth wide and began pulling in the space around it, three dimensions swirling into the gaping maw like water flowing into a drain.

* * *

The agent's blood ran cold as he felt his SOUL being drawn into an infinite, starless void. There was a bright flash, and then nothing but blackness for as far as the eye could see. The void must have extended for miles in every direction, but everything was so dark that it was impossible to judge distances.

(I'm falling...no, wait, I'm not falling, but the ground is missing?)

The agent looked at his paw, which still glowed with a faint purple light. Not dreaming, and definitely not dead.

(Arms? Check. Legs? Check. Well, well…seems the prince is no stranger to relativistic tunneling. It looks like all Hyper Goner did was send me to this strange place, and he even did it without losing any body parts. Why is it so cold in here?)

The agent tried to move around through all sorts of swimming motions, but there was more of the same blackness everywhere he went. It was hard for him to tell if he was moving at all, and he shivered violently as an unusual numbness began to spread from his SOUL.

(Strange dimension…There's nothing here, but why is it still so cold?)

He tried to say something, but there were no particles to transmit his increasingly panicked voice and no brain to telepathically shout at. Nevertheless, the alien hoped that his thoughts would be heard by something so that he could at least pretend he wasn't alone.

(What is your current temperature reading?)

A light blue text readout appeared in front of the agent with the words, "The ambient temperature is...nothing. This is a perfect vacuum: a space with literally nothing in it."

(But a warm body still radiates heat… I'm going to freeze to death if the isolation doesn't get to me first! Asriel, you son of a goat...)

He tried to warm his frozen paws as he meticulously inspected every cubic centimeter of darkness around him, only to find exactly what he expected.

(Okay...nothing over here, and empty space everywhere else. Maybe I should think a little, because there's no way I'll accept a slow and painful death here.)

The agent thought intently about why he joined the M.B. He jumped out of his skin when the voices of high-ranking agents to agents in training filled the void.

(Who said that? More importantly, how did they say that?)

Although he didn't fully understand how, the agent created something out of the unreal, empty void out of nothing. That "thing" was a figment of his imagination, but a "thing" nonetheless.

(I should be careful not to drive myself into hearing voices forever, but this is making progress. Let me try something else!)

The agent examined his memory about the rescue his team accomplished a year ago. An image of Asriel and Chara's helpless bodies accompanied the agent in the void, and it began to flicker with red light before vaporizing spontaneously. Meanwhile, a voice shouted, "They didn't do anything wrong; stop hurting their friend!"

(Interesting…this 'Hyper Goner' isn't just a vacuum; it's a canvas onto which deep desires and the like can be reflected. This gives me an idea, but it'll take a lot more will than that.)

Suddenly, a memory started flooding back. A pocket of red light shone brightly against the darkness of the void. The agent reached out to touch it, and it was absorbed into the agent's SOUL.

(Oh...ugh...that one. This is really going to hurt, but it'll definitely have enough punch.)


	6. Hope

_It was long. Narrow. Dim streetlights on one end but near-total darkness shrouding the other. Smelled like open dumpsters. Lots of shouting and a distinct, dry cackling, like sandpaper rubbing on bone._

 _Tires screeching. Flashing, blinding lights. More shouting._

 _My ears exploded. I lost track after 20 times. I couldn't see or hear, but I could smell something burning. Blood, too. It was dripping from my claws._

* * *

The agent's will sprang to life again, surrounded by a whirlwind of thoughts.

(I can't give up in this void now...)

He glared at the nothing before him. A vortex appeared above his shoulder and, under his direction, began lobbing magical blasts into the blackness. Purple explosions dotted the void, sending waves of energy rippling throughout the empty space but getting him no closer to an escape. He summoned a magical sword, but there was nothing to strike.

"Think…conventional attacks aren't doing any good here," the agent thought, "but my other attack…yes, that's it! I'll tear a hole in the fabric of this strange dimension lasting just long enough to jump through, and depending on how strong Asriel is it might even be enough to destabilize it. Here goes!"

(Black hole!)

The black orb obediently stopped mortaring the void and folded in on itself, collapsing into a much more energetic-looking sphere. It looked like a solar eclipse with a purple corona, wobbling and pulsating gently as its halo ebbed and flowed like a tide.

"Magical black holes," the agent pondered as he stepped back to face the singularity, "the greatest mystery of the universe ever so tenuously tamed by our extraordinary SOULs. They aren't _real_ planet eaters; I can't just magic the mass of a star into existence, but magic can replicate the effects fairly well. I wonder…how will 'Hyper Goner' fare?"

The agent closed his eyes and gestured, as if solving a difficult math equation.

(Let's see...reverse and reabsorb gamma rays as magical energy...)

He felt the vortex tug ever so slightly on his outstretched paws, but not so on the surrounding space.

(The gravity well still isn't working…but I could let the black hole emit Hawking radiation, growing ever more unstable until finally…yes…the explosion will send ripples through reality itself. Divert gravitational force to fuel the shock wave and steadily decrease angular velocity...)

The agent ripped a tiny fragment from his own SOUL and threw it at the black hole. Instead of being sucked in, the essence wrapped itself into a second ring around the black hole, as if ready to accomplish an amazing feat.

Pointing at the black hole, the agent thought, "And now...collapse!"

The black hole began to wobble violently, blasting out pulses of intense light. It caved in on itself, first the size of a charred watermelon—then an obsidian marble—then a particle worthy of million-dollar microscopes. When it could collapse no further, the singularity began swelling rapidly, white mass-energy complex seeming to expand twice as quickly every second. Not a moment after, a tremendous blast pushed back the dark void surrounding the agent.

* * *

On the outside, the goat skull began to shake and shudder from the attack.

"What's this?" Asriel thought, rapidly growing unsure of his victory.

Glowing white cracks began to appear in the goat skull until finally, it shattered with the power of a dying star and briefly eclipsed the Sun with a brilliant flash of light. The force of the explosion followed by the gravitational tidal wave rendered infinite DF into tissue paper and smacked the God of Hyperdeath for an actual amount of HP.

The agent stood among the shattered pieces of the goat skull, heart brimming with determination and paws overflowing with sparking energy. A purple glint reflected off his skin as he glared at Asriel and taunted, "You better start running now, because you won't be doing a lot of flying after I'm through with you!"

But Asriel didn't even bat an eye at the agent. In fact, the prince seemed confused and agitated.

(What? That determination! Only one person could have that much determination...)

"Umm…kid? This is the part where you say something about making me eat my own words…"

"Frisk! Where are you?" Asriel shouted suddenly.

"So, does this mean you're done fighting or…"

Asriel started looking frantically around the asteroid as if he had lost a valuable treasure, paying absolutely no attention to the fight he had left unfinished. The prince would have been easy pickings in this state, but luckily, his opponent seemed more interested in Asriel's next move than defeating him.

"Don't leave me! I'm sorry! I didn't mean to hurt you! I just wanted to break the barrier and help everyone!"

"What barrier? There's no barrier around these asteroids. What are you talking about?"

(What have I done…what did I do…Frisk! Where are you?!)

(Hmm…Asriel is searching desperately for someone named "Frisk," and it's pretty obvious that he isn't thinking clearly. If I can telepathically probe a little deeper, I can confirm who Asriel's talking about…ah! She's that last human!)

Asriel suddenly glared at the agent.

(Ack! Sloppy, sloppy, sloppy...and just after I told him off for being sloppy too...better get out of his head now.)

"You...Frisk isn't here, but you are instead..." Asriel said in a low voice.

"Yes. I'm here. It's all right. Frisk is fine."

"You have Frisk's determination..."

"No. You're just confused. Frisk is perfectly safe at home."

"You...you must have killed Frisk and stolen her determination for yourself!"

"Calm down; you're not thinking straight…"

"I...I'll stop you!"

Asriel called for help.

Six human SOULS: one green, one yellow, one purple, one blue, one orange, and one light blue appeared around Asriel's SOUL, which began to resonate violently. With the combined power of the SOULs, Asriel's paws began to glow brilliantly. He shouted forcefully, "Stop fighting, and just let...me...win!"

Asriel raised his paws and fired a tremendous rainbow beam at the agent.

"Stop it! Just...go away and let her have her happy ending!"

"But I'm not here to take that away! I just want to talk to them!"

The agent, completely unprepared for his entire field of vision turning into searing light, summoned a man-sized black hole in front of himself and jolted as the beam slammed into the magical vortex. The black hole strained and wobbled as its caster tried to contain the worst of the attack, but the rainbow beam was far stronger than anything he had ever seen before. He tried to brace the vortex with every last ounce of his will, but it slowly started cracking under the force of the beam.

Asriel's beam inched the black hole close to the agent. Not even his determination could resist Asriel's overflowing cascade of emotion. As the rainbow beam came within centimeters of the agent, the defensive vortex splintered and engulfed him in an explosion that dwarfed the power of his special attack.


	7. Lull

(Ugh…that'll hurt in the morning. Probably shouldn't use unstable vortices as magic shields…)

(Wait, what am I going on about? That blast would have knocked over a building, and if I barely took it…no, no, no...please, don't tell me…)

*SEARCH

(Kid! Say something! Anything!)

*Found one life form; identifying...

* * *

Asriel Dreemurr 50 AT 50 DF HP: 18,000/27,000 (SUF)

*It's unbelievable, but my scans indicate that this little goat monster is the same God of Hyperdeath you blew up earlier.

*Probability that he meant to hurt you is slim based on his incoherent actions, but that "no atmosphere" thing isn't very healthy for him.

* * *

The agent, still in bad shape from the God of Hyperdeath's last attack, half-limped and half-sprinted to his pile of scrap metal and retrieved two semi-functional chunks. He just as awkwardly returned to his opponent and placed a small, snow globe-like device near Asriel. With a whoosh and a wave of cool air, an Earthly atmosphere rushed out of the sphere and surrounded the asteroid. The agent then produced a cylinder containing an orange light submerged in a clear, gooey liquid, planted it into the ground, and gave it a half-hearted kick. With a single pneumatic thrust, the cylinder punched its egg-like contents into the rock. A warm aura began to emanate from the core of asteroid, gradually spreading to blanket the atmosphere in friendly coziness. Then, the agent extended his paw and launched a green orb at Asriel, healing him for 5,000 HP.

"Thank the heavens you're okay," stammered the agent to Asriel. "You really scared me for a moment there."

Asriel stopped crying immediately. Upon hearing the agent's voice, his face froze in sheer terror.

"It's you!" Asriel replied. "Oh, good heavens! I didn't mean to hurt you! I'm so sorry! Please don't kill me!"

Asriel covered his eyes with his floppy ears and stumbled away from the alien, uttering choked syllables between panicked sobs.

"You're going to kill me now and it's totally going to hurt..."

The alien followed him, shouting, "Wait, I was never going to—"

"I don't want to feel the cold darkness again!"

"If you could calm down for just a—"

Asriel cried louder.

(I don't know how to handle this, what with the only two experts I knew _being dead and all._ Please. Stop!)

The agent sighed and looked around. Finding two small boulders, he snapped his fingers, plopped them onto the rock in front of Asriel, and offered him a seat. Trying to explain himself, the agent shared a few more details of a rather unpleasant memory with Asriel.

(I made him go through one; it's only fair I do the same. Plus, he seems like someone I can open up a little to.)

Asriel was speechless for a good minute. To his opposite's relief, he had stopped sniffling and even seemed to be breathing at a normal pace.

"I never really told you my name, did I? It's, um… 'Luna', by the way. I'm afraid we've most certainly gotten off on the wrong foot...it's nice to finally, properly meet you this time."

"Heh…"

Asriel hung his head down, now feeling guilty for fighting the agent. The agent looked equally guilty for fighting an innocent child.

"I'm not angry at you, kid. Really, I'm not."

"Luna…so, you've run into bad people and lost someone you love, just like I did."

"Yes. They were slain doing what they believed in by people who jumped to conclusions. Yes. I lost control of myself. But, do you see this badge, your Highness? Same one my parents and their parents wore under their coats and it means my business is keeping people safe. I really don't want to hurt you or Chara as long as you're not robbing a bank or something. To this day, I'm still trying to accept the fact that I killed my parents' killers, and it's a bit too late for me, but you're lucky to still have Chara with you. I'd never forgive myself if I let something happen to your best friend."

Asriel smiled and hugged the agent. It was a comfort to know that the prince wasn't too badly injured, but something still tugged at his thoughts.

"This may seem a little random for me to ask, but you are an Earthling, right? You called yourself a 'Boss Monster' earlier, and it's not a term I hear all that often."

"Of course, I am!"

" _Then why on Earth were you flying around the Asteroid Belt, entire light-minutes from home? If my memory's not mistaken, aren't you only like eleven years old now?"_

"The Royal Scientist saw a strange object in her telescope one day, and she ran around telling everyone that she spotted what looked like a spaceship flying in front of Jupiter. I was basically the only monster who had a chance of surviving in space, so I snuck out to see the UFO for myself."

"Do you realize how unsafe that was? You could have gotten yourself killed out here! There's radiation from the Sun, dust clouds that'll choke and scratch you like if sandpaper was a gas, and not to mention our fighter squadrons patrolling these rocks…"

Luna stopped counting space hazards on his eight fingers to catch his breath, panting and pointing at Asriel but deciding not to scold him any further. Surely the little explorer must have had parents; for now, getting him out of harm's way was the higher priority.

"But you didn't get killed, so congratulations. I suppose you've earned the right to have your curiosities satisfied. That UFO was almost certainly one of our spacecraft, one which clearly needs its stealth field replaced. Of course, that means I'm not exactly a Boss Monster in the sense that I live on Earth with you and your family."

"But you look like one."

"I really don't know why that is."

Asriel pointed excitedly at his opposite.

"Maybe you're like a long-lost relative or something!"

The opposite accusatorily returned the gesture.

"Our entire society looks like goat monsters. It's probably just a coincidence Boss Monsters do too, and if anything, _you're_ the long-lost family."

Asriel shrugged and smiled.

"Wouldn't that make both of us each other's long-lost relatives?"

(I'm too tired to butt heads with this kid. I wish my coffee machine wasn't a pile of scrap right now.)

"Fair enough, but you seem a bit too fatigued to fly back to Earth—not that I would let you make the astronomical journey yourself, anyway."

The agent turned away from the prince and started toward flatter terrain, asking calmly, "I'd be willing to take you back, but do you think you could trust me a little and take me to Chara when we get there?"

Before he could get twenty feet from Asriel, a light flashed behind him and an unfamiliar voice answered, "That won't be necessary."

* * *

Chara Dreemurr 99 AT 99 DF

*Your subject, the First Human.

*LV 7.

*You sense a warping of the space-time continuum. It seems that Chara somehow teleported to the prince's side from Earth.

*Crimson upright SOUL.

*Holding a sharp dagger with one hand and shielding Asriel with the other.

*There is another life form here.

Frisk Dreemurr 15 AT ? DF

*You recognize the Eighth Human from Asriel's memory.

*LV 1.

*Intensely red upright SOUL.

*Determination Incarnate.

* * *

"Chara. How punctual you are, and even sparing me a few hours of tracking, too. I need to have a word with you—"

The toy knife in Frisk's hand began to glow red, causing a translucent, red dome to form between the agent and the trio. It was roughly the size of a medium-sized bus, extending from the brown rock to two times the caster's height at its summit. When the agent reached out to touch it, red sparks shimmered and the dome grew thicker. It was a bona fide shield spell created by an extraordinary human. Witnessing Frisk perform magic combined with the apparent teleportation caught him by surprise; after all, none of his colleagues had ever seen such a feat besides the enigmatic barrier.

(Looks like Earth children just teleport at will now. Man, I have not been paying attention to the society I've been assigned to keep an eye on…)

"Azzy!"

"Frisk! Wait, slow down…hey! Stop, that tickles! I'm okay! Really!

Frisk checked all over her companion as if looking for that one elusive boo-boo. Meanwhile, Chara lunged through the barrier at the agent, slicing at him with unbelievable speed and agility while shouting several variations of "Stay away from my brother!" The fatigued agent barely dodged the knife, which nearly tore through his outfit.

(How is this kid moving so fast?!)

Luna retaliated with a sword, missing Chara with every strike and narrowly avoiding a series of slashes in return. He tried the usual volley of flares and vortices, but the child was long gone by the time any of his attacks reached her. Out of nowhere, he felt a faint breeze on his back, and he ducked just in time to avoid being decapitated from behind.

(I'm about to get my tail handed to me by _another_ kid. This is embarrassing, not to mention the possibility that Slashy over here's about to literally hand me my tail. Now think...there must be a way out of this...)


	8. Fire

"You're here for me, aren't you?"

The alien clutched his sword close to himself with both paws, backing away on his feet only slightly faster than his pride was. Chara started following him, still twirling the knife around as if it was a toy.

"Chara, be careful!" replied the other.

* * *

Boss Monster ? AT ? DF HP: 65,173/275,000

*LV ?

*Has low HP.

* * *

(You're a strange one, aren't you? What's a monster like you doing looking around for me up here?)

"Don't worry, Frisk. Just let the monster who nearly killed our brother apologize," Chara replied.

"Nearly killed?" Asriel asked, surprised.

The young prince laughed and explained, "You should have seen it, Chara, it was so cool! First this guy comes out of nowhere in a spaceship and crashes, and then I used Chaos Blaster and lasers were flying everywhere and then we had a sword duel and I won!"

Asriel's somewhat embellished account made the agent blush a little, but more importantly, the atmosphere around the asteroid seemed to lighten up immediately. Chara concealed the knife behind her back and, after another moment evaluating the goat monster, slipped it into her pocket.

"Way to go, Azzy!" Frisk exclaimed.

"Well, if Asriel was beating you that hard, I think we're the ones who owe you an apology," Chara smirked.

The agent couldn't help but crack a grin. Whatever Asriel did, it seemed to convince him that Chara hardly deserved to be treated as a threat and relieve him that he would not have to fight another innocent SOUL to get to her. He pulled up two more boulders, asking the two human children to sit down.

"Okay, what really happened was..."

The agent gave a more realistic but still dignity-sparing overview of his fight with Asriel, being sure to mention that it ended in a draw.

"We'll need to track you every time you approach this asteroid field, but I'll ask the patrols not to bother you anymore."

"Now that makes more sense because _someone_ cried at the end."

"You always were a crybaby, Azzy," Frisk added.

The color their brother's face turned made the alien's blushing look a snowy pale by comparison.

"Guys, not in front of the space alien...Anyway, Frisk, Chara, this is Luna. He's apparently not just a Boss Monster like I am, but an alien soldier from outer space who I totally beat in a fight! How cool is that?"

The alien opened his mouth as if to amend Asriel's claims, but refrained and produced a badge again. It had a star in the middle but wasn't a lustrous gold or silver like the police officers' on the streets and in TV shows.

"I...well, I was here to investigate Chara's involvement with the barrier and potential foul play, but it's obvious that she isn't a hardened criminal," explained the slightly embarrassed agent. "Someone who willingly trades his or her life (however rash that choice was) in order to help free a civilization clearly demonstrates the ideals of heroism and bravery."

"Well, I did get into a fight with a monster who kept trying to force me to buy baked food at ridiculous prices, but I stopped before it became too late to turn back," Chara confessed.

Frisk clarified, "And we all forgave her and she truly regrets it."

With a change of heart, the agent pressed a button on his device and said, "Right, um…that wasn't what I've been trying to find out at all, but…thank you for choosing me as your confidant? Considering every unbelievable thing that I had to go through for the sake of this assignment, I believe everything you've all said so far. There's not really a reason not to since I have the details behind the barrier breaking, too. I'll even let that bit about the food fight slide under the rug because I don't feel comfortable charging a kid with assault and battery right now and I'll let the me fight slide because I'd be admitting to losing against that kid. However, the fact remains that the M.B...might not be satisfied with my report which, to put it lightly, contradicts every bit of prior data they have and names a human as the savior of monsters. If your government has a pardon or something like that, now would be a good time to use it. They'll probably still come back, but that will certainly help your case."

Asriel stepped in readily and, in his best attempt at a regal voice, announced, "Chara Dreemurr, as the prince and a high authority of the Monster Kingdom, I hereby grant you the rights and privileges of a diplomat of the Monster Kingdom, including all legal immunities as enjoyed by all diplomats."

He stood up as straight as he possibly could and his voice even got sort-of deep and dramatic. The agent smiled while the trio burst into laughter.

"That'll do. Once again, I apologize for any harm I may have caused your brother and I will give my colleagues this update immediately."

The three Dreemurrs gave Luna three thumbs up.

"You know," Chara said, "there's one really important matter we haven't talked about yet."

"What is it?"

"Can we pet you?"

Luna looked at Chara in disbelief, as if the proverbial bolt from the blue had escaped Earth's atmosphere and flown past Mars just to strike him in the face.

"...what?"

"I want to know if you're as fluffy as Asriel!"

Before Luna could protest in any way, the two human children rushed the boulder he was sitting on and started running their fingers through the fur on his head. The alien tried to pull away from them at first, but something about their light touch was oddly relaxing. He didn't move—he didn't _want_ to move—and the only noises coming from his mouth sounded like an unearthly purring. If he had a choice, he'd curl around the coziest slab of rock the asteroid had to offer and never get up again.

(Hmm…a little rough but still feels warm and soft. I should make Azzy let me use him as a pillow before he gets less fluffy.)

Asriel tugged on the alien's arm and offered, "If you want to come visit the Monster Kingdom, I'd be happy to show you around."

"Yeah, I'd love to see how the monsters would react to a super soldier from the future!" Chara said excitedly.

"I really appreciate the offer," the agent replied, "but I have more work to do. By any chance, do any of you know anything about a W.D. Gaster? He's a bit of a cold case by now, but it feels like a waste not to ask while you three are here."

The agent presented a rather disturbing picture of a disfigured, impossibly pale face. It was captioned "Wanted for Murder, Torture, and Crimes Against All Civilization."

Even without the caption, the rogue scientist's distorted face was easily capable of rattling the minds of those unfortunate enough to cross paths with him. All three Dreemurrs suddenly looked distressed, visibly frightened from Gaster's horrible visage. Still, the agent pressed forward with his photograph.

"You know Gaster. All three of you. Your silence speaks volumes compared to the countless dead ends and useless tips I've chased after. Tell me everything. Now."

Two adult monsters, one male and one female, appeared in front of the kids in another large flash of light. Both somewhat resembled Asriel in God of Hyperdeath form and looked exceedingly familiar to the agent. The female wore a robe like Asriel's while the male had an elegant crown atop his head.

* * *

Toriel Dreemurr 80 AT 80 DF

*Frisk didn't teleport them here; you were watching her the entire time. After you deal with Wingding, go find the bonehead who keeps teleporting monsters and humans into space.

*Anyway, this is Asriel's mother.

*Master of fire magic.

*You feel the passion of a mother trying to protect her child. It feels a little like sunlight.

Asgore Dreemurr 80 AT 80 DF

*This must be Asriel's father.

*Master of fire magic.

*Asgore looks as angry as Toriel.

* * *

Having their comfortable chair and golden garden immediately replaced with a warm space rock and a celestial backdrop left them speechless, to say the least.

"Where are we?" Toriel asked Asgore, head craning around like a periscope in an effort to process her new whereabouts.

"We seem to be in space." Asgore replied.

Toriel and Asgore looked at the agent, who was still holding Gaster's "Wanted" poster. He tried to hastily dispose of the offending document, but the parents had already read every letter and the atrocities they dripped with.

"Who do you think you are, talking to my children about that?" Toriel scolded.

Asriel hugged his mother and exclaimed, "Mom!"

"Are you kids okay? Did that strange monster with the flashy cape hurt you?"

Asriel smiled proudly and replied, "No, Dad. Besides, I think he got hurt way more in our fight than I did."

The king offered a high-four and exclaimed, "That's my son!"

"Gorey!" Toriel said to her husband. "Stop encouraging our son and think about these circumstances for a second! He must have done something to our children!"

While the king and queen went to check on Asriel, Luna produced a holographic screen and started typing a message to the asteroid fortress he departed from, pausing every so often to glance at Asriel's parents.

(Their concern for their son's well-being is admirable, but I would think that there's a far greater problem with this entire situation. I guess I should arrange for their return trip now.)

"Wait a minute, Tori. We are in space now because Frisk and Chara asked him for a teleport before we did, and Frisk and Chara were here because they believed Asriel was in trouble. If he didn't teleport Asriel, how did all _three_ of our children end up here?"

Toriel suddenly glared at Luna, who locked eyes with her for a moment, understood the storm that was about to break loose, and, for lack of ways to stop the impending mess, nonchalantly continued to type into the hologram.

(And here it comes...)

"You kidnapper! You were the one who brought him here! If you did so much as harm one hair on his head..."

* * *

Asriel Dreemurr HP: 23,000/27,000

*Looks somewhat choked.

* * *

Asriel, still recovering from the effects of exposure to space, looked out of breath. This seemed to confirm for Toriel that her child was indeed hurt.

"Don't worry kids, we'll take care of this evil monster," declared Toriel, preparing a fireball in her paw.

The agent immediately fumbled for his badge; he and Asriel stuttered simultaneously, "Wait, if you could just let me explain—"


	9. Breakthrough

Strange Monster HP: 70,002/275,000

*Looks oddly familiar.

*Doesn't seem to want to fight.

*Perhaps you and Asgore can scare him away instead.

* * *

Two fireballs roared past the agent's face. When the crackling blue light faded, the queen noticed a degree of apathy in his eyes, as if he was both impatient with and relieved by her presence.

* * *

Asgore Dreemurr HP: 250,000

*You asked your ally to keep his distance and attack with ranged fireballs if the adversary steps closer.

* * *

Luna placed any weapons he pulled from the fighter craft on the ground and backed away, trying his hardest to appear nonthreatening. Unlike his previous encounter with Chara, this time he even had his paws raised above his shoulders in a half-surrender.

"I didn't kidnap anyone. I have only a faint idea of how your son got into this region of space and even less of an idea how those two humans teleported here without being intercepted by the nearby station. I also admit that I fought your son, but there was nothing else I could do at the time. The important thing is that everyone is okay now, and I don't want to fight you. Let's just stay calm and have a little chat, okay?"

"Then hop into your UFO or however you got here and leave Asriel alone!"

Toriel's protests only seemed to harden the agent's resolve.

"I'm afraid I can't do that."

Luna glanced at the wrecked pile of spaceship components. Toriel followed his gaze and returned an accusing glare.

"That heap is a death trap! Just what happened up here between you and my baby? Did you put him in there?"

Toriel stomped the floor once, causing a pillar of fire to erupt from under the agent. The agent narrowly dodged it, but the heat from the pillar was intense enough to briefly ignite one of his ears anyway. He waved and jumped around frantically and eventually blew his ear out, but it looked a tad more tender than before.

"Ow! No, I promise; that's another long story. And that isn't the only reason I can't leave yet. Your son may have information that could help the Morality Bureau catch the most nefarious criminal alive. I just want to ask Asriel a few questions."

"Morality Bureau?"

A wave of recollection washed over the king; curious, blue hologram of a badge looking more and more familiar. Toriel had another fireball aimed at Luna, but Asgore grabbed her arm and interrupted the attack.

"Gorey?"

"Tori, do you remember him? Those monsters from a few years ago? This guy is one of the agents who saved Asriel from the humans. Space kidnapper or otherwise, don't you think we owe him a chance to explain himself?"

"I know, but Asriel really doesn't want to talk about it right now, and if this guy's hunting Gaster, he could put our children in even more danger."

* * *

M.B.A. HP: 69,000/275,000 (BURN)

*Still not fighting.

*Not even remotely scared away.

*Frisk and Chara are talking with Asriel.

*Asriel has calmed down a little.

* * *

The air cooled around Toriel as she lowered her paw, asteroid once again reaching a comfortable lukewarm temperature.

"Even if Asriel wanted to talk with you, how do we know we can trust you?" Toriel inquired. "After all, you said that Gaster was a nefarious criminal. You could very well put my kids in harm's way by involving them in this."

"Mr. and Mrs. Dreemurr," reassured the agent, "my squad is the best of the best in the M.B. You have nothing to be worried about. Gaster will have to go through us first."

The agent put an electronic device to his unburned ear and waved to the other rocks. A large, rounded, dark, metallic object displaying the shield and star on its multiple fins appeared from behind a mountain ridge and began to coast around the asteroid.

* * *

Bzzt.

"Sir, what's going on down there? You've reported two humans plus two more monsters, HQ's traced four more unknown life forms since you first took off, and now you're all having some kind of tea party?"

Luna replied, "Sure. May as well join us, because we'll all need rides in a moment."

The dropship gradually dipped down, hovering around the asteroid a few hundred meters away behind a line of hills.

* * *

"In fact, your Highness, there they are now. If for some reason that flying fortress full of goodies isn't reassuring enough, I also have something that you two should look over with Asriel."

The agent gave Toriel and Asgore an electronic chip with the case file on Asriel's rescue from the human village. The Dreemurrs tapped the device; when it spat out a dozen holographic plates into the air, they glanced through the reports, surprised at some of the details of the mission.

"Armed humans? A gunship? _Black holes?_ This is an unusual way of showing how you'll ensure their safety…"

"It's a step or two thousand back, but you had a right to know. So, now you know. One of these paws belongs to someone who gets into trouble and the other, someone who got them out of the same trouble. I brought them home with my own two paws, your Highness. I won't let them get hurt again."

"You mean you really smacked the guard in front of everyone?" Asriel asked, welling up with excitement.

"Yes," the agent explained, "I was the acting commander, and if I knew then that he was the one who did that to you, I would have smacked him many, many more times. I did such a good job at scaring the humans that the M.B.'s considering making me a permanent commander."

Asriel smiled.

"Okay, I'm ready to talk to you about Gaster. But first: Mom, Dad, there's something I have to show you."

Asriel called for help, made his parents jump back by taking on the form he used to fight the agent a moment ago, and then reverted to his child form.

"Remember when the six human SOULs disappeared from their jars on the same day that the barrier broke? The truth is that I was the one who did it. I let them out of their containers and then they started telling me about how they wanted to be free from the Underground."

Asriel opened his mouth to describe what happened next, but the guilty look on his face told all.

"That explains how the prince got here; now, would any of you care to share how you miraculously appeared—"

"And then you absorbed them? Do you know how irresponsible that was? All that raw power could have burnt you to a crisp! You are in so much trouble when we get home..."

"I know, Mom."

With the asteroid no longer a hostile environment, finding the mystery teleporter could wait. Listening to his slightly timid voice, Luna couldn't help but feel a little sorry for Asriel.

"If my word is worth anything, your son used the power of the SOULs to destroy the magical barrier. He did what he did because he wanted to help all of monsterkind, even if it meant risking his own life in the process."

Toriel shook her head and insisted, "No. Not Asriel. There's no way that happened. You said you would come back one day to break the barrier, didn't you?"

"I wouldn't lie about a failure that brought us such shame. It did happen, and your other two children can testify to that effect. Anyway, it's not my business to tell you how to raise your child, but don't be too hard on him, okay?"

Toriel turned to her son and said, "Asriel, we'll talk about this later."


	10. Invasion

Putting a paw to his chin and glancing off to the side, Asriel tried to piece together any memories he had of the strange monster man. There were plenty of happy moments with two jovial skeleton brothers, but none of them came remotely close to matching Luna's description. But like a putrid lump of coal in a pile of shiny gemstones, one recollection stood out for all the wrong reasons.

"It all happened a while after the barrier broke, one day when Frisk, Chara, and I were playing around in Waterfall. We stumbled upon an open metal door that we had never seen before. We looked inside, but it was too dark to see anything."

"We started half-joking around, saying that Mettaton was probably filming a horror movie or something. Chara dared me to go inside, and when I did, the air got really cold around me. It was also really dusty. I walked around a little and heard a scream that made me jump out of my skin, and when I backed away, I bumped into a tall monster in a black robe. The monster looked at me with his horrible, cracked white face and said..."

 _"The darkness keeps growing...the shadows cutting deeper...dark...darker...yet darker..."_

"His voice wasn't loud, but it hurt my ears like a piece of glass scraping against a chalkboard. Then, he reached out and tried to touch my face. Before he could, I ran screaming out the door and into Frisk and Chara. I told them what happened, and we ran back to our parents and told them all about the creepy guy in Waterfall. We all went back to Waterfall, but the metal door was closed and locked. Mom and Dad told us not to go back there again."

The M.B.'s newest commander smiled quietly and gave his witness a hearty pat on the back.

Happily, he announced, "A secret base hidden underground, protected by the one thing that we couldn't find a way around? Clever. Just when we worried that the leads had frozen forever, the M.B. now has a hope of finding Gaster. You all have my sincerest gratitude."

The commander signaled to the carrier, which landed beside him.

"We'll take you back to Earth, but now would be a nice time to say farewell. Even though we're headed to the same place, I'll be leaving for ZY-9 immediately after I search Gaster's house of horrors. It was (mostly) a pleasure meeting all of you, though, and I'll definitely be taking up your offer in the future."

"Wait."

"Your Highness?"

"If this Gaster is as bad as he seems, you're going to need all the help you can get."

"No. I can't thank your son enough for the lead, but the Dreemurrs have given us all the help we'll need. This operation is easily ten times as unsafe as the one you were shown. You two need to stay home with your children until this is all over."

"We are not figureheads, commander. We have a duty to protect our subjects as king and queen; if that includes fighting, we're far from pushovers in that regard."

"Fair enough, but do not underestimate anything you see. Don't forget that Gaster has eluded the full force of the M.B. for years. Few know what he's capable of, so stay close. Safety first, even though the safest place for you all is far, far away from Waterfall. If something goes bump, _do not_ go looking around for it by yourself. If something brushes up against your leg, there's no shame in running screaming out the door again."

No point in trying to talk them out of an operation in their own territory.

"None of this, of course, applies to _you three_. You'll be home and playing Humans and Monsters or whatever it is humans play with monsters."

"What? But that's not fair! Why do Mom and Dad get to go chase bad guys?"

* * *

 _"Mom, Dad, the M.B. is so awesome! I want to be a cool crime fighter like you guys! How long before I get to help you beat up those mean humans?"_

 _They were like superheroes, and while everyone wanted to be doctors and scientists, I never thought of anything else for myself but being them one day. I'd even been practicing with magic, too, so I raised a claw and created a glowing, white star at my fingertip. Mom was impressed; she clapped her paws together and spoke in sweet tones while Dad playfully patted my head._

* * *

Luna's breathing faltered and his gaze un-focused for a moment, but he composed himself and responded, "It's too dangerous. Non-negotiable; you're staying out of Waterfall until your parents tell you otherwise."

Everyone, feeling varying levels of indignance, boarded the waiting destroyer, which departed from the asteroid, activated its wormhole generator, and headed straight for Mount Ebott. Jumping out of a wormhole, the vessel emerged above the ruins of the human village and landed near the cave entrance to the Underground.

After a few hours of sneaking and ducking around the locals, Luna, six moderately armored agents, and two Dreemurrs gathered in front of the mysterious door in Waterfall. His voice interrupted the sound of trickling water.

"Here we are. If any of you would like to reconsider, this is your last chance. We have no information about the contents of this room; it could be empty and we'll have come here for nothing, or it could be a trap with some ungodly surprise in wait."

Nobody reconsidered.

"Very well then. Everyone ready?"

Luna crouched down and inspected the grey, steely doorknob from a lot of different angles; apparently satisfied, he gingerly reached for it with his paw. Before he could turn it, the entire door fell over by itself with a thud.

"Back! Everyone back!"

Nothing happened, which only further unnerved everyone. The pitch-black rectangle Luna was shouting at seemed infinite, as though a step inside would plunge them into a cold void for all eternity. Despite being covered in fur, the investigators shivered as the air throughout Waterfall seemed to plunge about twenty degrees. Asriel's parents became pale as a sense of dread loomed over the group. Luna took the lead and the agents followed, treading quietly, and groping around the walls for a power socket.

"This one's safe. Turning on the lights now," reported one agent.

A single fluorescent lamp in the middle of the ceiling buzzed to life, illuminating the lab with a weakly insufficient greenish hue. Even though the bulb couldn't reach into the dim corners, it became obvious that behind the metal door was a huge lab, walls lined with terrible instruments and machines Gaster undoubtedly used for his twisted experiments. One machine was lined with bloodstained spikes. Another had two buzz saws attached. A third was a dentist's chair with mechanized claws hanging overhead. The lab must have measured at least twenty feet on all sides, but every cc of air reeked of dust and decay. The Dreemurrs took one guess where the dust came from and took on the same shade of color as the ambient light.

The commander instructed, "Fan out and look for Gaster, but keep eyes on at least one other agent. It's pretty obvious that we're not welcome here, and I don't want anything to happen to our 'guests.'"

The agents donned four-fingered gloves and began to search the lab, peering around each and every machine. Every so often, one of their ears would twitch slightly, as if to pick up an almost imperceptible whisper. No matter how many times they turned around, the nagging, burning sensation of being watched never fully went away. Eventually, they reached the end of the room, but despite every rattled nerve shouting otherwise, there was no sign of Gaster.

"No one is here, sir."

"Check for clues. Gaster may have hideouts outside of this one. We've come too far to lose sight of this target again. If you've opened a cabinet, listen for any secret mechanisms. If you've touched a bookshelf, check each and every page for any passwords. If you've turned over a stone, turn it over once more."

Some of the agents began to sweep Gaster's disturbing furniture choices with a black light, hoping to uncover telltale traces of the mastermind. Others rummaged through desks and cabinets in search of secret documents and possible leads. Suddenly, the overhead lamp sparked and failed.

"Hey, what the— "

"Who touched the switch?"

"Who just bumped my leg?"

"Help! Something's got me!"

The light began to glow a toxic green again, amidst a flurry of voices from agents.

"Is everyone okay?"

"No signs of explosives or chemicals, sir! We kept an eye out for booby traps and tripwires and didn't find any."

"Sir, we're not missing one head…actually, we're up two!"

 _"Excuse me?"_

One voice came from an unlit corner behind the commander.

"Come to find your parents, little monster?"

Luna turned around.

The black robe melting into the ground as if it was a putrid, oily spring.

The two-forked, cracked skull frozen into a malicious grin.

The hand holding a scalpel against Asriel's neck.

Asriel himself was tied to a blood-soaked gurney.

"Sir, he's got a hostage!" an agent said worriedly.

The commander raised a paw, warning everybody to keep back.


	11. Fight

"Frisk? Chara? Am I seeing things? Did Gaster pull out a chemical weapon we've somehow missed? Would someone tell me what those three are doing here?"

Two human children were hiding behind one of the agents, fingers digging into their coat like anchors.

"Did you see them come in?"

"I thought _you_ were watching the door!"

"Ugh…too late."

The alien stuck out his paw and materialized a sword. The others prepared ranged cover with a combination of spears and fireballs.

* * *

 _Dad glanced out the window and spoke in an uneasy voice._

 _"Honey?"_

 _He pointed at a shadowy figure across the street, barely visible between the illuminated spots provided by streetlights under the night sky. The figure was dressed in a black robe and had a bare skull-looking thing for a head. It was too dim outside for me to tell for sure, but it had to have been either a horribly disfigured human or a human-shaped monster._

 _What I could tell was that the skull was cracked over the right eye socket. I remember the fracture much more clearly than I want to: it started just under the eye, forked into two cracks, and continued over the forehead and scalp. It wasn't flesh red either; just pitch blackness you could get lost into if you stared too deeply._

 _Mom's voice suddenly became as shaky as my Dad's. For some reason, that shadow outside the window made them as jumpy as a box of springs. I really hoped they wouldn't leave, but they couldn't just let that thing escape either._

 _"Son, just stay in here, okay? It's not safe out there. Mommy and Daddy have to deal with a bad man outside."_

 _"Do you really have to? What if it's too dangerous?"_

 _"We'll be fine. Just wait here and we'll be back in no time. I just remembered a really good story you'll definitely want to hear."_

* * *

"Wing Ding Gaster," Luna dictated authoritatively, "I was told you were smarter than this. Did you honestly fall so hard from grace that your mind fell out of your head? If you think putting a child between us is going to save you, then there's only one way this is going to end."

Gaster laughed raspily and reached toward Asriel's SOUL.

"Don't you touch him!" Chara shouted, throwing her own knife at Gaster's hand. The commander raised his own paw and performed a grabbing gesture, stopping the knife in midair before it hit Gaster.

"No sudden movements, Chara. As for you, Gaster, let's cut to the chase. What do you want? Money? Power? Pillows to go with that white sheet of a face?"

"I think you understand the situation now, for I have the prince's life in my hand, and we both know you won't do anything that could harm such an innocent SOUL, and that includes letting your friends harm me. What will happen is that you will let me extract the six human SOULs from your precious child. Then, you will give me ten million G in exchange for the prince...if he survives, that is. Everyone leaves with all that matters to them, otherwise..."

* * *

W.D. Gaster ? AT ? DF

*LV ?.

*Holding Asriel hostage.

*'Proceed carefully' isn't nearly a sufficient statement.

* * *

Gaster made a cutting motion with the scalpel. Everyone gasped in horror, except for the alien leader, whose face started to take on a curious expression. He leaned over to whisper into the king and queen's ears; they nodded and whispered back.

"Fine. One of you, go to the treasury and fill a sack with gold coins."

Two agents left the laboratory. Fifteen minutes later, a goat monster returned carrying a cloth bag, filled to the brim with sparkling currency.

"This down payment contains one hundred thousand gold pieces, one of a hundred needed to form the ransom. As you understand, it will take some time to gather all the funds, but in the meantime, I suppose you can weigh it to verify the count."

"Do you take me for a fool, agent? You are stalling to prolong this boy's life and give your colleagues time to maneuver to more advantageous positions."

"What's the rush? The boy clearly isn't going anywhere, and you would have already been surrounded from the very beginning if that was our strategy. You may as well count the gold now while we wait for the next installment to arrive."

The agent with the ransom removed a cart from the wall, loaded it, and gave it a hearty push in Gaster's direction.

"Hmph. You aren't the impetuous goat boy you used to be. Perhaps still some crossed wires in the cranial area, though. I suppose I'll have to humor what is either your good faith or your mental short-circuiting. One…two…"

"Three."

A fireball struck Gaster from behind, its caster the other agent who had accompanied the coin courier. Seizing an opening, the commander space-tunneled himself between Gaster and Asriel, knocking the former backward and the latter toward the other agents, who freed Asriel from the gurney immediately. Blade in hand, Luna swiped at Gaster's midsection and left a deep cut in his oily form, but the goop slopped over itself and quickly filled in the damage.

* * *

M.B.C. HP: 251,699/275,000

*LV ?

*Death.

* * *

"Oh? You want to participate in my experiments that badly? Well, then, I could always use more _test subjects_ …"

Gaster slid to the left and raised his hand, expelling a dark fog toward the commander. This attack wasn't a smoke screen in preparation for a sneaky escape or a toxic acid cloud eating away every square inch of his skin at once, but something far deadlier only a warped mind could design. Everyone else saw a catatonic goat monster staring off into the darkness, completely oblivious to the enemy mere feet from him, but Luna seemed fixated on something lurking in the smoky trails.

* * *

 _They were loud and horrible and each one made me flinch and cover my ears, but then they stopped too and I leaned out around the car's trunk._

 _"Mom? Dad? Are you okay?"_

* * *

The fog thickened. Laboratory walls started melting at the seams, falling away to reveal a quiet city street. The commander's face petrified after hearing a series of gunshots. Gaster grasped the scalpel in his right hand and oozed toward his unresponsive opponent, drawing a volley of magic and fireballs in retaliation. Each impact knocked a blob of tainted sludge loose from the rogue scientist, but he kept advancing, formless form hardly slowed down by the attacks.

"It's a trick, Luna! Snap out of it!"

"Don't you see, kid?" Gaster taunted. "Your parents were too weak to defeat me and neither will you."

The commander was entombed in a prison of his nightmares, reality crumbling all around him as the fog worked its way into his lungs.

"You can't give up!" Asriel shouted. "That's not what your parents would want!"

The alien shook his head free and returned a fierce glare; at the same time, a magical firewall from his companions consumed the poisonous cloud as if it were gasoline vapors.

* * *

W.D. Gaster ? AT ? DF

*You feel emboldened.

*The fog has disappeared.

* * *

Luna raised his paw and pinned Gaster to the wall.

"You think you're the good guy, Agent?" sneered Gaster, "You're as guilty of murder as I am!"

"Good. Then this won't be very difficult."

Steeling his nerves, Luna drove his weapon through Gaster's deformed body, taking care to aim for where his heart should have been. With a blood-curdling scream, Gaster turned to dust, gently settling on the icy floor as the alien wrenched his weapon from the wall.

"…that was too simple. Anyone else reminded of a decoy?"

A shadow materialized behind him.

"Sir, behind you!"

From the base of the sludge, a gooey, oily tentacle shot toward Luna's neck. He ducked and chopped off the overextended tip with a well-timed swing, sending a spray of foul liquid onto the walls. Another appendage attacked, this time from the front, but darted just out of reach when he swung again. Swiftly, the tentacle wrapped around his waist, picked him up a meter or so, and slammed him onto the ground.

"Ugh…oooh…what, am I the only one with a sense of preservation around here? Attack him!"

Chaos ensued as torrents of fire, earth, stars, and rainbow lightning flew at Gaster. Even Frisk and Chara got into the fight, either by shielding allies from Gasters or by slashing and stabbing at Gaster with toy and real knives. Yet, each time Gaster got burned by fireballs, fried from Shocker Breakers, cut by knives, or mowed down by meteor shot, he instilled a brief sense of hope by turning to dust, as monsters typically do upon fatal injuries, but crushed it as quickly by reappearing somewhere else. Without a definite body to strike at, it was impossible to tell if they were actually landing solid hits on the enemy, but Gaster had the group at the mercy of his fluid, psychological tricks.

"Fools!" Gaster shouted. "Don't you remember the power of the void? Countless SOUL fragments…limitless possibilities…it's mathematically impossible; you can't break down that which has infinite parts."

An octopus's worth of tentacles lunged at Luna, who dodged and sliced through the first five, but got tripped by the sixth one, disarmed by the seventh, and was now being dangled upside-down by the eighth one wrapped around his ankle.

"Um…retreat!"

Everyone bolted for the exit, but Gaster blocked the door with a flowing wall of black goop. Now trapped, the agents and Dreemurrs looked on helplessly as the scientist tapped into the height of his unnatural powers—dozens of Gaster lookalikes emerged from the walls at once, shuffling towards them with disturbing smiles frozen onto their faces. All the copies began mumbling lyrically, filling the caverns with their distorted thoughts.

"Darker...and darker...the tests must continue..."

"Not if we have anything to do with it!"

One agent nodded to their colleague, took aim at the metallic-plated wall that flanked the blocked door and clenched their paw. One second later, there was a crunching, whooshing noise and a door-sized hole where the wall once stood.

"Run for the outside! We'll buy you time!"

Frisk, Chara, and Asriel fled the room as fast as their legs could physically carry them while Toriel and Asgore lobbed fireballs at any Gaster clones trying to grab them. The king and queen ran after them, being covered in turn by volleys of magic. Luna's raiding party caught one last glimpse of their leader being thrown clear across the lab and sprinted for their lives down a subterranean corridor. Rapid footsteps echoed loudly off the rocky blue walls, interrupting the steady dripping of trickling water. As the group made their way down the cobalt dirt path, Gaster clones continually rose from tar-black puddles and tried to grab at their furry ankles with their cold, lifeless hands. More and more black puddles began to dot the ground over time, as if a buried petroleum reserve had suddenly sprung one thousand leaks. To the party's dismay, the Gaster clones eventually numbered in the hundreds and blocked their only visible exit out of Waterfall. The agents and Dreemurrs turned around frantically in search of another way out, but they were now fully surrounded by Gasters.

"You'll never take us for your so-called experiments!"

"Just give up...close your eyes...it'll all be over...eventually..."

One of the Gasters stepped forward, summoned several disembodied ghostly hands out of thin air, and sent one of them flying toward Asriel's throat.


	12. Destroyer

The shape of a Boss Monster's paw caught the ghastly hand before it could lay a finger on the prince, cracked it with an iron grip, and casually dipped it into a dark vortex. Gaster recoiled, wincing as if the figure crushed the bones in his actual hands.

* * *

Luna ! AT ? DF

*Seems a tad miffed.

* * *

"Hello, _doctor_. I'd keep your hands to yourself from now on; we wouldn't want them _broken_ , would we?"

"Sir! You're alive! But how?"

"I must've been stunned by whatever I landed on, because all I remember is glass breaking and coming to in a puddle of strange liquid. Ugh, I hope it wasn't anything nasty…"

Floating a few centimeters above the dirt and in front of Asriel was the shape and form of a Boss Monster, complete with ears and short horns. The only glaring difference between "Luna" and what the commander looked like an hour ago was that Luna's hide was now covered in black markings and radiating faint purple light. The fissure-shaped mark on his neck glowed like a volcanic crack in the growing darkness.

"Wait. Stop the clock. What just happened to my body?"

As the alien glanced confusedly at his ashy paws, an agent sporting a puzzled look replied, "You turned into a purple death cloud?"

"Well, obviously! I'd like to know _how_!"

Asriel remembered something and told Luna, "Mom told me legends and myths about monsters who had fallen in battle after taking a single hit strong enough to destroy their SOULs completely. Many fell down and turned to dust after that, but a few were able to call on the greatest limits of their magical power and keep fighting on. It could only happen if the monster really cared about something they felt like they had to protect, and we had a special name for them."

" _They were filled with Determination_."

"I certainly feel as if I just gulped down a triple espresso...wait, are you saying that spill I woke up in was some kind of SOUL extract? Eww….!"

"That gross stuff's supposed to be _super_ intense, though. Sorry we snuck in; we just didn't want to miss the fun."

"Heh, don't have to tell me twice!"

With a telepathic pulse, he whispered, "I let him leave the lab before you could all get to safety, and I apologize for my failure. But, good news, I found some of our good doctor's notes next to where I landed. A bare minimum amount of magic holds the clones together. _One good hit_ and they'll fall apart, so use rapid, weak strikes or area-of-effect projectiles to maximize damage. _Those hands_ are the source of most of Gaster's abilities—taking them down will both figuratively and literally cripple him. And above all…don't be afraid. Our chances won't get better unless we make them so."

Luna stared straight into a horde of Gasters, raised a paw, and shot an energetic vortex directly into the crowd. A massively amplified explosion blasted dozens of illusory clones into dust, shaking bits of rock loose from the roof as vibrations propagated down the rest of the cavern. Luna glanced at the purple smoke rising from his paw afterward, awestruck by his new form's raw power.

"Your notes claim that all of these are clones of you, copied over and over again as the void tore you into pieces. Turns out we were wrong to blame 'henchman' for what happened to my parents because _you yourself_ were responsible all along. You're the reason they went into the alley in the first place, and you're the reason they're not here with us today. But we're still here. My friends may not be able to kill you 'infinity times,' and neither can I. However, we'll kill quite a lot of you at once and it'll hurt all the same."

"Gaster...I have but one thing to say to you, but you've already heard it from me."

 _"I'll tear you all to shreds!"_

* * *

W.D Gaster ? AT ? DF

*That connection to the void let him get around the barrier, and he'll most certainly disappear again if you let him.

*What are you waiting for? Tear him to shreds!

* * *

An explosion of magic consumed the lead Gaster as the other monsters began to blast the clones by the dozens with their own repertoire. Gaster reappeared and the illusions rematerialized behind him, advancing as if they were a pack of hungry zombies.

* * *

Luna ! AT ? DF

*Smells like a barbecue.

* * *

Gaster materialized a pulse-less hand and fired a white beam from its palm at the commander. The commander dived aside, easily dodging the attack.

Another vortex flew across the cavern and detonated against Gaster's skull. Gaster reappeared and the shadows around his feet grew into black tentacles, attempting to ensnare the commander again. One of them wrapped around his ankle, but he effortlessly grabbed it with his paw, burning it on contact with magical energy. Gaster recoiled, smoldering appendage retreating and rattling screams echoing throughout Waterfall.

"Galacta Blazing!"

Asriel summoned a glowing star, grabbed it by one of its five arms, and tossed it at Gaster as if it was a Frisbee. Even though it wasn't very strong without the full power of the human SOULs, it still tore through Gaster's fluid form like a hole puncher through paper. Several more stars followed in quick succession, but despite everything, the party had hardly made a dent in Gaster's army. Where thousands were cut down, thousands more rose out of the ground to replace them.

"Well, Agent? You don't need to be a scientist to know that it'll take a billion years to kill me at this rate. And what do you think will happen then? Do you believe that your parents will come back to life? Do you think killing me will somehow negate the EXP you've gained?"

"And do you believe I'm here just to act out my personal vendetta like some bullheaded vigilante? Even if that was once true, Gaster, this became a matter of others' well-being the moment you threatened that child's life; a matter of whether the galaxy would be a better place with you somewhere inside a black hole. But you already know the answer to that, don't you?"

Luna summoned singularity after singularity, tossing them into hordes of clones as if they were cosmic hand grenades. The Gaster taunting him fell to his knees, each of his 'deaths' feeding a primal desire for revenge that slowly began to overpower any thought of procedure.

"I don't care if it takes a billion years. I'll be satiated eventually and another one will be glad to practice on a _child killer_. But you…you should hope this ends long before that. Every time you die, we'll get a little better at targeting your weak points. Every time one of your copies dies, you wince as if the blow struck you instead. The longer you persist, the more pain you'll feel, so just _die already_!"

After a few minutes of extermination by black hole volley, the lone surviving Gaster found himself panting and clutching where his stomach should have been. Luna started walking towards him, making slicing gestures at the air and mercilessly sucker-punching his nemesis with a series of flare shots. Once he crossed the cavern, he grabbed his slumped opponent by the neck, flashed a vicious smile, and tossed him into a man-sized black vortex.

"Good riddance…"

Luna felt about ready to scream, run around hugging everybody, fall onto his knees, and cry into the strange blue dirt, and jump for joy all at once. On the outside, all he could manage was a quiet, satisfied smirk.

"We're safe now," Toriel noticed.

"That stranger really killed Gaster," Asgore remarked.

"Didn't think he had it in him," Chara said.

"Butterscotch-cinnamon pie, my treat!" Frisk exclaimed.

"We're totally getting promotions for this!" exclaimed the agents, as they exchanged high-fours.

"Pain…? You, concerned with how much pain I feel? I disposed of that useless sensation a long time ago. I feel no pain!"


	13. Save

Asriel Dreemurr inf(AT, DF)

*A black tumor is growing on top of Asriel's SOUL.

*Better than him escaping again...right?

* * *

"Are you feeling pain now, sweet prince?"

Asriel was now in God of Hyperdeath form, floating and grinning evilly at the Commander.

"No...not like this," cried Frisk, horrified.

"Azzy!" Chara shouted.

"Get out of my son!" Toriel demanded furiously.

"Well?" Asriel asked with a sneer.

Violent revenge had given him an intoxicating rush, but the prince's voice, half friendly and half malevolent, sobered him somewhat. Separating a hostage from their captors' grip was a trick he could perform with finesse, but he never anticipated the hostage and captor being one and the same.

"You came so close, kid. In that regard, you truly are your parents' son. Just like them, you failed and someone small and innocent paid for your mistake. You can't erase me without killing your friend, so I guess it's time for you to give up and die like your parents did!"

Gaster's words cut deep into Luna's mind, causing a tear to form in the corner of his eye. More surprisingly, a tear formed in the possessed Asriel's eye as well.

"Get out of him. You've never had a chance at ransom and you're not escaping this time. Submit yourself to justice now, because the courts will most certainly put you to death in their own creative way if you hurt the child."

"Shocker Breaker!"

Luna dodged and readied his sword against the possessed Asriel but couldn't bring himself any closer to launching an attack at him in front of his family.

"I hate the void…"

'Asriel' turned his arsenal of stars and rainbows on the other members of the group instead, causing them to dive out of the way and duck behind a short wall of rocks. The barrage eventually stopped, but it was too early to feel relieved. Two sharp blades were charging directly at him, and a second later, Luna found himself parrying a rapid cascade of strikes.

"Come on, kid, don't give in like that!"

'Asriel' swung high. Luna ducked.

"Don't you remember who we are? Don't you remember... _me_?"

'Asriel' went through the motions leading up to a low sweep, but caught Luna off guard with a bash across the face with the hilt instead. The blow sent him and his sword flying across the cavern and left him on his back; before he could stand up, the possessed prince lunged on top of him and swung a Chaos Saber directly at his head. Just in time, the alien recovered his own sword with a tugging motion and stopped the white blade inches from himself. After a moment of struggling, Luna kicked the prince away but noticed a familiar surge of power building up inside his opponent.

(No honor among thieves, I suppose. This is the last copy of Gaster desperately clinging to a way to stay alive, and I'll never forget the build-up to Hyper Goner. Either act fast, or tell my parents to bring out the guest chairs…)

"Hey, kid! I know you're in there with this coward! I also know you promised Frisk here that you wouldn't hurt anyone, and if you don't fight this bonehead right now with all you have, _you're going to break that promise!"_

'Asriel' raised his hands, and a goat's skull appeared and began to laugh diabolically. Space-time started to collapse into its calcified mouth, but the skull shuddered and vanished into white sparks. The space it compressed bounced back like an ocean wave, knocking everyone off balance and sending ripples through reality itself. He wouldn't have guessed it from the somewhat overenthusiastic sword fight, but it seemed that Asriel was trying his darndest to resist Gaster's influence after all.

The alien stood up and wiped a tear away. He couldn't exactly afford to wait for another chance.

(I need to target that spot on Asriel's SOUL…but how? Monsters keep their SOULs inside their bodies when they fight; it's just something we do unconsciously to protect ourselves and Gaster's using it to shield himself like a virus inside a cell. I'll have to pull them apart…this will hurt him, but there's no other option.)

The commander raised a paw enclosed entirely by energy and snapped his fingers. A tenebrous vortex rushed toward Asriel's possessed body. Just as it drew within a few inches—near enough to pull on the prince's hairs—Luna crouched, teleported to Asriel, and, black hole passing just over his own head, drove both his paws into the prince's stomach for a forceful telekinetic push. Asriel's body went flying toward the hard stone wall, but his SOUL, delayed by a split second, was caught in the vortex and being tugged black-side-first by the gravitational field; which, many times stronger at the darkened end of the SOUL, began to elongate the floating heart into spaghetti.

(I'm sorry…this _must_ feel as painful as it looks…but you're a tough kid. It'll be over soon, okay?)

With surgical precision, the moving black hole ripped Gaster's infection from Asriel's SOUL and vanished, white heart reuniting with its rightful owner and black spot splattering onto the ground like a popped balloon. From the slop, Gaster's physical form reappeared, although he was on one knee and seemingly too exhausted to fight.

Asriel reverted to his child form and opened his eyes as several bewildered agents started tending to him. Luna dispelled some of the excess magical energy stored within him, reverting into his snowy normal form. Some of the energy coalesced into a heart, reforming his own SOUL as if it was brand-new. It was the very opposite of a finishing blow; at that, everyone in the cavern looked absolutely dumbfounded.

"Sir, what are you doing?" asked an agent.

"Are you really sparing this vile demon after all the pain he's caused?" cried Toriel.

"No, Mom, he's sparing a scared, confused man, " Asriel explained. "From what I learned about him, the space goat never really wanted to kill anyone. He was just forced to once in his childhood, and he's spent the rest of his life trying to make up for that."

"I know how that feels, " Chara chimed in. "Asriel and I nearly destroyed the entire world because we felt we had to protect everyone from those evil humans. If Frisk hadn't forgiven us and given us a second chance, we wouldn't be here today."

"Forgiveness…?" Frisk added.

"No, Frisk…I'm not forgiving him…"

"Letting him go…?"

"I'm…not…"

The alien bared his paws, showing viciously sharp claws one-by-one at the end of each of his fingers.

" _I just wanted to use my own two paws for this!"_

Everything became quiet and all the voices grew muffled. The other monsters' and humans' forms became indistinct blurs; for a split second, there was nothing except for the detective and the murderer. Luna reared back and lunged at the kneeling scientist like a tiger after a fresh deer.

"No! Stop!"

Before a single claw could pierce Gaster, Frisk and the nearest agent grabbed and restrained the commander by his arms. Disbelieving, he tried to squirm free and shouted, "Let go of me! Let me at him!"

"You don't have to fight anymore! He's given up! Please, don't kill him!"

"He took Mom and Dad away and tried to do that to your brother too…I'm only doing what should have been done years ago! You shouldn't even be here, Frisk; go away!"

The alien pushed the eighth human aside and went for Gaster's face with his free paw, but the agent holding his other arm locked their own arm around his waist, hooked his leg with their own, and sent him to the cave floor with a concerted throw.

Keeping their weight directly on top of Luna, the agent whispered, "Sir…I'm going to let go of you now, and we're going to stand up and take a walk outside. Gaster has surrendered, and you know it in your heart that your parents would never attack a disarmed, surrendering man. You wanted vengeance; well, having him in custody is the best revenge an agent can get."

The agent helped Luna to his feet and, when the alien didn't immediately sprint for the fugitive's neck, took their paws off him.

"Okay. Calming down now. Um…thanks."

The agent smiled and patted him on the shoulder. Out of the corner of his eye, he noticed the glint of Frisk's approving smile and another agent approaching with a data chip.

"Remember what your parents' original mission was?"

* * *

 _Later, the M.B. told me that the creature was a henchman of an extremely high-profile target—W.D. Gaster. Gaster was a rogue scientist who surfaced at around the same time the M.B. began investigating Mount Ebott. He was, to their knowledge, the only monster who had managed to circumvent the Barrier, and with simultaneous sightings of "boogeymen" by the humans in several cities, he must have been able to send his cronies through reliably. We had a major interest in him, but we couldn't recruit his ingenious mind. Several humans and probably some monsters "disappeared" because of him. My parents were told to capture him, interrogate him for his quantum-tunneling-like methods, and deal with him as they saw fit._

* * *

Luna nodded, briefly perused the files contained in the electronic chip, and walked over to Gaster.

"You are responsible for the death of my parents, Gaster, " the commander spoke in a low voice, "but 'murderer' doesn't describe you completely. The M.B.'s done homework on you. One of your experiments left you fragmented in the void, didn't it? You were alone. Afraid. You couldn't feel anything because there was nothing to have feelings for. It's a cold, lonely, maddening place, isn't it?"

The last few words stirred Gaster, who looked up at the commander.

"I..." Gaster stuttered.

"But you can feel them now, can't you?" the commander continued, "When you attached yourself to Asriel's SOUL, you felt how the Dreemurrs love and care about each other. You can feel how afraid they were when you tried to hurt their son. Maybe you can even feel a little of the grief I still carry for my parents. But that single, solitary teardrop didn't belong to Asriel, did it?"

(Chara did say he was a crybaby…the true Asriel would have either cried _more_ or not at all…)

"Could the scientist; the man dedicated to improving the lives of others, still be buried under this madness? Could there still be a trace of a kindly SOUL from before the traumatic laboratory accident it suffered in silence through?"

Reaching into his robe, Gaster produced two white outlines in the shape of hearts. Luna caught a glimpse of something else glowing white behind his enclosed hands.

"For…a long time, I couldn't experience feelings. Even when I got out of the void, I could feel nothing more than the cold that enveloped me. But I was a scientist and I was determined to figure out how to make myself feel emotions again. I did all those horrible experiments to all those humans and monsters, desperately looking for anything that could help me explain why I just couldn't feel. I realize the pain and suffering I caused everyone…in fact, it nearly crushed me while I was tethered to his Highness."

"Numbness for an unimaginable time followed by one of the monsters with the most to feel for…not really the smoothest transition you could have chosen."

"It seems that eliminating all of those fragments has helped reassemble the pieces of my mind. Like a…neurological reboot of sorts."

Luna sized his opponent up from head to toe. While the Gaster he impaled earlier looked like a cracked, dead face floating in an oily pile of goopy madness, the monster he was talking to looked much more stable and solid. The gash in his head was gone, and his body now had a discernible human shape cloaked in a black robe.

"Commander, these two hearts are what I could recover of your parents' SOULs. I was shocked when you suddenly blasted those two humans into pieces, so I grabbed them and fled without thinking. The least I could do now is return them to you. I know it's a mere pittance compared to the pain I've caused you, but if it means anything, I'm deeply sorry about your parents; about leaving you there while making my own escape. If I turned myself in right then and there, it would have at least given you a sense of closure."

Luna carefully held the remains, weighed them in his paws, and promptly collapsed onto the cavern floor.

* * *

(No more of that liquid determination stuff…not ever again…I don't think I've ever felt so tired before in my life!)

The next day, Asgore held a grand reception in the MTT Hotel. Having undergone extensive renovations and excavations since Frisk's visit, this entrance to the CORE was now an island surrounded by boiling oceans, connected to the rest of Hotland by a single bridge that the hotel's owner was all too happy to charge a toll for crossing, at least for a week until the Royal Guard politely asked him to stop. Banners with the Delta Rune and the M.B. insignia hung from the vaulted ceiling, which flickered with orange light as waves of magma crashed against the rock outside. Close to a thousand monsters and a few dozen agents were in attendance.

"For special services performed on behalf of the Monster Kingdom far beyond the call of duty, I am proud to present these medals of recognition to seven of our dearest guests."

Asgore placed a series of medals around the commander's and his agents' necks. The alien leader shifted uncomfortably and started reaching for his necklace of three seconds.

"I don't think I should have this."

Luna scratched his head and looked aside, as if trying to avoid showing his face to the audience.

"Some of you have noticed my semi-violent tendencies, as well as the things Gaster and I said to each other, and, well, I, um…lashed out and murdered two humans when I was a child."

Luna removed his medal and hung it around the neck of the nearest, now-slightly-confused agent.

"I can't escape from my guilt. Eh, you're probably more deserving of this."

"You were a child then, and you made a mistake. Everyone is guilty of something, but guilt is not everything. You, in particular, have experienced the rare opportunity to confront your parents' killer. It would have been justified to avenge your parents' deaths right then and there, but you still found the emotional maturity in yourself to show mercy. In your case, you have repaid that mistake a thousand times over at this point. I think I speak for everyone here when I say that we forgive you for the things you've done." declared Asgore. "I'm sure that your parents forgive you as well."

Loud applause rang throughout the Underground.

"Thank you," replied the commander. "For several long years, we have been chasing this great evil, and we've finally destroyed it. However, we couldn't have vanquished this evil without the help of three incredibly brave and somewhat accidental heroes."

Luna summoned his sword.

"It is my great honor to present this sword to the three children of the Dreemurr family."

A purple spark ran up the black blade as the alien passed the handle towards the prince.

"Frisk. Chara. Asriel. This sword is technically a replica, but it glows with the same dark energy as its original. We have a tradition back at the M.B. where commanders bestow upon their teammates one copy of their signature weapon, but I can't think of anyone more deserving. Despite everything, your intentions have been and are still pure of heart. I know it'll serve you well because I know you'll choose to do the right thing."

Asriel carefully held the energy blade before passing it to Chara, who weighed it in her hands and, feeling dissatisfied with how it swung, gave it to Frisk. Even louder applause ensued as well as a round of well-deserved hand-and-paw-shaking and hugs. The applause stopped abruptly as a robed figure approached the stage.

"My name is W.D—"

Everyone jumped to their feet, murmuring and preparing an avalanche-sized barrage of magical attacks in the general direction of the stage. The commander motioned for the agents to lower their weapons.

"Hold your fire...he's one of ours now."

"As I was saying, I am Gaster. I'm sure you are all familiar with the horrible things I did, and some of them to your friends and family. I know I can't make up for my crimes, but the commander here has helped me begin to convert part of my lab into a fully-functional research hospital. It is free of charge and open to everyone, of course, and from now on, I will dedicate my life to healing pain instead of causing it. As a start, I have refined an inexpensive antidote for buttercup poisoning—in chewable tablet form for young monsters and humans, of course."

A final wave of applause shook the walls of the Underground. The atmosphere was so enthusiastic, in fact, that the walls continued to shake even after the applause stopped. To everyone's horror, the sounds of gunfire joined in and the smell of smoke filled the air.


	14. Darkness

The commander looked out of a window. All over the Hotlands that the CORE's one and only hotel overlooked, dozens of buildings were either on fire or completely destroyed. Hundreds of human soldiers were towing camo-green artillery pieces into position and aiming them directly at the ballroom. He stuck his head back in, turned around, and shouted in an urgent tone, "Hostiles approaching fast! Get away from the windows and keep your heads down!"

* * *

"Fire!"

* * *

Announced by a piercing, unified bang, a barrage of shells flew toward the hotel's main tower. At Luna's frantic urging, Toriel, Asgore, and a dozen agents in the audience raised their arms, summoning a shimmering, crystalline magical shield that crackled with every blow it absorbed. The humans, meanwhile, mechanically prepared another salvo.

The second burst of shells raced out of the cannons, followed a parabolic trajectory to the shield, and shattered it as if it was a glass pane. Several of the monsters recoiled from the sudden disintegration and hurriedly tried to rebuild their defenses for the third wave. Asgore turned to Luna and said, "We can keep regenerating the shield, but it isn't effective against their bombs and it won't last forever. We have to do something about this."

But Luna seemed lost in his own head, shivering and worriedly muttering, "No…They can't be…"

"Sir?"

"…This isn't happening…Not now…There's too many…"

"Excuse me? Commander?"

"I can't save them all!"

Other monsters began to express their panic over the attack.

"Have these humans lost their minds?"

"But the war was over! Why are they doing this again?"

"They're going to kill us!"

Amidst the flurry of voices, Asriel shouted to the commander, "You have a plan, right?"

Time was up. They needed an answer _now_. Luna paused for a moment and then summoned a miniature black hole in the palm of his paw. After just enough time for its master to think of a reassuring-sounding scheme, the sound of its violent collapse shushed all the commotion immediately.

"Yes," he bluffed.

The monsters were still looking at him expectantly. A one-word plan netted him one second of reassurance, but it would hardly win an entire battle.

"Okay, um…first, we can deduce from the manpower outside that some high-ranking human, far beyond the scope of the nearby city, is responsible for this act of war. It would be great if we knew what was happening above ground."

He raised a paw holding an electronic device to his ear, but instead motioned to Frisk, who lent him her cell phone. Nowhere to proceed but forward; if there was no escape from certain doom, the alien would just have to keep pretending until reality decided to follow his lead.

"I can't signal for help with that...if they're serious about this invasion, Triple O could already be compromised. Had better use an innocuous radio signal instead. Gaster, do you think you can change the frequency on this thing? I need to make a little call."

"Of course, I can."

The former royal scientist took the phone and started tinkering with it. With every screw he loosened and wire he reconnected, the shield and walls trembled under the relentless artillery. After five minutes of rather stressful background shelling, Gaster finally returned the phone.

"Luna to Earth Office," asked the commander, "what's going on up there?"

The receptionist at the M.B. Earth Office switched on an encrypting device and answered, eyes glued in disbelief to a human news broadcast on their screen.

 _"The United Earth Government is now acting on its resolution to address the large-scale monster breakout. A coalition is being assembled to put down the monster insurgency swiftly as we speak. Several representatives from the UEG have assured us that the operation will not interfere with citizens' daily routines and should conclude by the end of the week."_

"Bad things are happening. The media has painted you all as some kind of violent uprising, and it looks like the United Earth Government has mobilized against the Monster Kingdom. Tanks, helicopters, fighter jets, you name it. I tapped into one of their communication lines and it seems that with the barrier gone, they're looking to _genocide_ the monsters off the face of the Earth rather than seal them again."

"They've got us pinned down here, too. We need a battleship, but do not come out of full cloak yet. We stay hidden until we can't hide ourselves anymore."

"Luna, I tried that already. HQ says we can't afford to involve ourselves in a conflict between the native populations of Earth. As soon as there's a lull in the fighting, we're supposed to evacuate and regroup at the Office."

"You _do_ realize that if we abandon the monsters, they'll be completely eradicated? My unit's crowded around my shoulders whispering to me right now. We're going to help them stop the fighting or die trying, HQ be darned."

"Think about this, Luna—"

"We both know what the other commanders and their units will decide. Trust me, we don't want to fight either, but we need an insurance policy. Get us a battleship, or say your farewells to every one of us."

"Sigh…you owe me. Big."

One large spacecraft snuck away from its counterparts anchored around ZY-9, emerged from the asteroid field and began to charge its wormhole generators, coordinates set for a geostationary orbit. The Earth Office operative switched to an intercepted satellite image and reported to the commander, "Bad news is that it'll be a while before the cruiser will be ready to warp to Earth, and I'll send an E.T.A. to you momentarily. And before you ask, I have worse news. The mountain is absolutely crawling with humans. They have the west cavern entrance barricaded and they've established encampments in plains south of Ebott. It looks like they're arming a nuclear bomb. If that thing gets into the Monster Kingdom, it's the end for all of you."

"Are they aware that we're in here with the monsters? Do they know what's inside the shell they're about to crack open?"

Shouts of "Come out or we're coming in!" rang out from Hotland proper, carried by the superheated air circulating over the lava pools.

 ***Reinforcements in 10:00:00.**

"Ten hours...ten hours…we'll keep negotiations running for ten hours and then everything will be all right again. We can handle this. Just keep talking and listen to their demands. Your Highness? Are you ready?"

The commander, six agents, and the Dreemurrs approached the front door, with a small force of other agents and monsters not far behind. The door opened and the detachment of monsters began to walk slowly across the bridge. They met a group of human soldiers in the middle, and both the humans and the agents instinctively pointed their weapons at each other. The humans looked surprised to see that some of the monsters were clothed in the gleaming metal and glowing light of alien technology far beyond their own, given that their intelligence stores described them as pre-industrial.

"Here we are," the king spoke. "You have already caused extensive property damage to the Monster Kingdom and there are civilians in that building. What you have done is an act of war against us and we can worry about that another day, but right now, they are terrified. By meeting us on this bridge, you have already shown that this does not have to end in only one way. Nobody else has to get hurt. What do you want?"

As much as common sense hoped otherwise, there was no doubt that _something_ was different about these monsters. The human lieutenant snapped out of his awe and responded, "We sealed you monsters underground so you wouldn't threaten us again. Now that the barrier's broken, it seems you've overstayed your welcome."

(Perfect. They haven't pieced it together yet; they still think we're some kind of Dreemurr Family Reunion.)

"We are no threat to your world. Why must you come here?"

"It's too risky for us to let the monsters go. Who knows what could happen if we let you loose on the streets with your magic powers?"

"But the monsters have made their contribution to the world peace thus far. You humans were the ones who attacked us first, and it is clearly unjust to seal us underground like this. It does not have to be that way. We can share the planet as we have already done for centuries."

"Earth is _our_ world. The surface is our territory, dotted with our cities and filled with our families. I have two daughters back home, and I'd give my life before I leave them a world with dangerous monsters running around. Now get out of the way. It must be done. We have to put you down now before it becomes a bigger problem down the road. If you lay down your arms, we'll try to make it as painless as possible."

Something about those words stabbed at Luna's ears.

" _'Put us down?'_ We're not some infestation! Don't your religions and your codes of law tell you how wrong this is? You don't have to do this!"

"We're just following orders, buddy."

"But—"

Before the commander could finish his last sentence, he felt something throbbing around his forehead—an unusually quick object cutting through the air from somewhere far behind the human platoon getting closer and closer with each passing millisecond. He shoved the king away as hard as he could and dived out of the way himself. The object whizzed harmlessly past his side; he heard the whistling pass his ears, but there was still the ripping sound of a metal-against-skin impact and someone behind him cried out in pain. When the commander turned around, he saw that Asriel was clutching a bleeding wound near his heart. Asriel staggered backward and collapsed; lying on his back, the prince raised a quivering arm toward the sky as his family, Luna, and a few agents rushed to his side.

"Azzy!"

There wasn't a tear in the kid's eye this time. His furry face was just that of shock, bullet piercing him faster than his innocent mind could even comprehend. Breath wavering and strength rapidly fading away, he mumbled weakly, "I...I'm..."

"No, you aren't! You're going to be okay; just hold on!"

Luna grabbed a handful of bandages from one of his colleagues and pressed them against the wound. A faint white heart rose from the prince's chest, suspended in midair like a tiny celestial body and trembling as if ready to break apart at any second.

"...sorry..."

There was a cracking sound, and the heart shattered into floating white bits.

"I'm not losing you again!"

A green orb worth 5,000 HP flew from the commander's fingertips into Asriel's body. Nothing happened.

"Get me a medical team!"

With great effort, Luna hurled a larger, more intense green orb worth about 100,000 HP at Asriel. Still nothing happened.

"Wake up; come on, _wake up_!"

He knelt down, grabbed Asriel's body and tried to shake him awake. He placed a finger on the prince's neck and hoped beyond all logic for a faint pulse; a breath; a weak quiver; anything to prove he hadn't failed to protect one of the last beacons of hope he had ever known. An agent placed a paw on his superior's shoulder, trying to comfort him.

"Sir, don't kill yourself trying to heal the prince...he's gone."

A second sniper's bullet struck the distracted, grieving commander. Luna winced and clutched his arm, grimacing and baring the full length of two viciously sharp teeth above the two short points that usually protruded from his mouth. The mark on his neck began to glow, though not nearly as intensely as it did in the Waterfall caves. All the humans began to back away slowly as if the alien commander had just announced he was made of lit dynamite. The young prince was dead, and he wouldn't be the last with everyone standing out in the open. Finally realizing this, the commander felt a familiar spark of dark energy at the points of his claws. He pulled out Frisk's cell phone again.

"Luna to Earth Office, our situation's turned dire."

Despite everything, he wasn't shouting furiously into the phone; given his reaction to Gaster hurting the child, he sounded comparatively calm.

"That battleship needs to wormhole to Earth yesterday. Shots fired underground; a civilian's been murdered and thousands are at risk."

 ***Reinforcements in 6:00:00.**

"As for all personnel currently on Earth...it seems the Minister of Justice was right about this world after all."

But then his companions realized: he was _too_ calm. After watching the other commanders return nods, his voice grew cold enough to freeze Hotland over as the last words dripped out of his fanged mouth.

"This is the acting commander of the Morality Bureau with new intelligence regarding the Earth. All forces under human command, underground or otherwise, are now considered enemies of the state. All present commanders confirm new designation."

Several more agents began to take potshots with their magic from various windows of MTT Resort, prompting the human ground team to dive for cover.

"We have about 30 seconds or so before they break free of their mortal terror, so here's the plan. I'm going to create a distraction, and when I do, monsters, I want all of you to run as quickly as you can back into the MTT Hotel Lobby. The other agents and I will hold the humans off at this bridge, and then we'll join you there and work out a proper strategy. Ready?"

* * *

Human Lieutenant 345 AT 50 DF

*LV 15.

*Monsters are weak to human attacks while monster attacks are weak against humans.

*You wonder if it's just a myth told to scare little monsters.

* * *

A vortex tore through the ranks like a bowling ball and exploded, injuring a few humans instantly and sending the others flying backward. The other agents held their ground outside of the CORE, mowing down human after human with energy blasts and magical incantations while the Dreemurrs helped lead their terrified subjects to safety. Any who survived the counteroffensive were swiftly torn to shreds by the alien commander himself, leaving a pile of charred bodies in his wake. After a few minutes of carnage, the M.B. detachment burst through the door and began to establish defensive positions, regularly popping out from behind cover to take aim at enemy soldiers as they tried to cross the bridge. Luna came running in a moment later with Asriel's body slung over his uninjured shoulder, only to witness a horrible scene. Many of the monsters were in shock, overwhelmed with tears, or shaking from utter fear while more than a few agents had been cut to pieces by gunfire.

(This is hopeless, isn't it? I have full confidence in my team, but we're a bunch of stragglers compared to the army outside. We hardly belong here in the first place; how are we supposed to win a war without any supplies?)

"Luna! Look out!"

The alien commander was knocked over by a nearby artillery burst, but looked up just quickly enough to see a fireball sail through the lobby, out the door, across the bridge, and square into the face of a charging human.

"That artillery's absolutely dreadful!"

"What?!"

"I said, 'that artillery's very loud'!"

"I can't hear you, Your Highness! The artillery's too loud!"

The king and queen pushed open a door to the hotel's ballroom and hurriedly motioned for him to follow. Catching a glimpse of the many monsters huddled inside, Luna realized that they had a working army after all: one that numbered in the thousands and required no weapons or ammunition. The only problem was that most of them were civilians. As reluctantly tolerant as service made Luna to violence, he couldn't simply rally monsters who had never even touched a weapon before.

 ***Reinforcements in 5:45:00.**

Nevertheless, he had no other option. Luna caught the door to the ballroom, calmly walked toward the podium, turned to face the audience of monsters trying to hide from the madness outside, and froze.

(What am I doing?! There's no way I can ask them to do this! What if they get hurt under my command, or even worse?)

An exploding shell detonated from the direction of the lobby, and out of the corner of his eye, Luna saw an agent fly across the room and land in a crumpled heap.

(It's now or never, Luna. Just take a deep breath, let the ringing fade out, and...)

"Can I have your attention, please? As you all know, we're trying to hold off the humans at the bridge outside, and we're just barely managing to keep them out. I know I have no right to ask this of any of you, but..."

The words choked the commander as if they were angry pythons. He was shaking as if the nuclear bomb was already inside; as if the wires and a pair of cutters were resting in front of him.

"We, um...we..."

"You need us to help fight them off, don't you?"

From the center of the front row, Chara had risen and was now staring holes through Luna while clutching a knife in her hand. This deeply disturbed him, to say the least.

"Yes, but there's absolutely no way I'm going to let human children fight other humans. Sit down. Please."

"Do you realize who you've got on your back?"

Luna, more than a little distracted at the moment, only now realized that he had been carrying Asriel's body over his shoulders the entire time. The bullet was still there, too; just somehow, it slipped his mind.

"Those so-called humans killed our brother, they killed the six children whose SOULs he was looking after, and they probably killed every monster who decided to stay home today!"

"That's more than probable, but..."

Frisk stood up alongside Chara and drew a toy knife.

"Partners until the end."

All the other monsters began to rise out of their seats, shouting a variety of battle cries and brandishing magical weapons over their heads.

"For the prince! For family! _For justice_! Those humans won't win again!"

Luna tried his best to calm the volunteers, reminding them that they would be required to risk their lives and claim lives of their own, but everything he said only seemed to encourage them further. Not even Toriel and Asgore could convince their two children to reconsider.

"Sigh…if all of you are on board, then we move on to our next issue. How shall the integrated command structure work? Who's in charge?"

Everyone stared at him.

"Wait…don't look at me like that! I can't lead this army! I don't know how to fight an entire war! My unit gathers intelligence!"

"Don't look at me, I'm just a communications specialist!"

"And we're royal guards, not royal soldiers! What are we supposed to do?"

"Calm down, all of you!"

At once, any M.B. or monster not currently attacking hushed their voices. The eager volunteer was none other than the king himself, holding a blazing red trident with one paw and Toriel's paw with the other.

"As much as I loathe this bloodshed…I believe we should take the role of supreme commanders. Though experience has been thankfully scarce in these recent years, we know our country and land intimately."

"Yes. My wife is correct; it is our duty to see you all safe and sound. Under us, I believe, should be the lieutenants of the Royal Guard and the Morality Bureau. You possess tactical insights we do not, and we can make the most of terrain and layout. Are you all comfortable working with each other?"

"Yes, Your Majesty."

"We must, Your Highness."

"As for the rest of you…I request that you listen to the guidance of our sub-commanders as you would my own. Centuries ago, our forefathers founded this kingdom so that all monsters may live in peace; that we may live as neighbors, as friends, and as family. Now, we find ourselves in defense of that peace once more. As our ancestors fought side-by-side for their survival, so too must we now join forces. It matters not whether they are 'outsiders' or familiar faces. They will do their best to see us through this dark conflict, but the best commander is no better than his or her individual soldiers. No matter your role, we cannot win this battle without each and every one of you."

Lots of monsters started cheering again. Even the ones posted at the front door paused to salute before returning to their combat.

"Then we begin. First of all, we will need information. Luna?"

"Of course. Could I get a blackboard and some chalk?"

Sketching a round, finned missile, Luna asked everyone to raise a hand, paw, or claw if they knew what a nuclear bomb was. About ten percent of the monsters replied affirmatively.

"They were on their way out for being too inhumane, but it looks like our kind wasn't included in that. A nuclear bomb is the single most powerful weapon that the humans have. It is far stronger than any magical attack any of you can imagine, and if one went off right here, right now, it would easily blow the top off Mount Ebott. Anyone within a kilometer of the blast will be blinded and incinerated instantly, and the surroundings will become a heavily irradiated wasteland. Unfortunately, there's one on the surface right now and those human soldiers are trying to make it explode right here, right now."

 ***Reinforcements in 5:10:00.**

"The good news is that by attacking us, these humans have started an interstellar war. M.B. isn't a typical military branch; we aren't supposed to challenge other militaries. But…if they've resorted to taking hostages and shooting children, they're no better than a gang of thugs. We'll help you defend your homeland until they skin us all alive and then assist you in a counterattack if the war continues to that point."

It was a difficult justification to make on behalf of a group sworn to peacekeeping, but nobody was rushing off his or her feet to accuse them of overstepping their authority. Another commander nodded and asked, "But there's bad news too, isn't there?"

"Any of you who saw a glimpse of the human army outside knows that there are about a hundred M.B. in here and at least a thousand of them out there. They've got us surrounded, and unless we put up some kind of resistance, they're free to wheel in the bomb and blow everyone to bits. You all know of the M.B.'s extraterrestrial origins, but they don't. Those humans might eventually distinguish between M.B. and monster based on who's carrying a glowing spear, and they'll try to kill us all the same. Agents: if someone's hide is getting shot today, make sure it's yours and not theirs."

Several of Luna's colleagues gave the monsters reassuring looks and nods.

"The mountain which trapped you with its unforgiving rocky walls, ironically enough, can just as easily protect you from harm. We need not worry about aerial attack while down here, and in fact, a battleship will be joining the fray in roughly five hours. Until then, we mustn't lose control of the Underground and taking our home back will begin here."

A plastic folding table was brought in. Toriel retrieved a tourist's guide, complete with helpfully labeled maps of the Underground, and unfolded it until it reached the size of a poster.

"Where are my glasses…ah, here. First of all, we need a small group of you to head to the barrier room and fortify it. It makes no sense to leave through the front door while leaving the back door unlocked."

Four agents and a dozen monsters walked out of the ballroom and up the stairs.

"We also need to stem the flow of enemy forces through the entrance that they have been using all this time. There is an…old house…in the Ruins that may be useful. If we can ambush groups of enemies as they make their way in, we will also buy ourselves more time."

A commander opened a wormhole and stepped in, followed by a group of nondescript monsters. They reappeared in a bedroom of the house in the Ruins, spread out into all the rooms in that corridor, and peeked out into the darkness to see intermittent groups of soldiers walking through the front door and down the stairs.

"There is an artillery emplacement on the roof of our laboratory in Hotland. If we can capture that building, it will free up everyone who is currently holding up the magical shield. With their help, we will have a much easier time defending the bridge."

Another commander opened a wormhole and found themselves crowded by destructive-looking monsters, including one in a dark robe.

* * *

"No, no, no, G, you stay right here. I know how this works: you tag along and 'help' us fight the humans, and then you use the commotion to either slip away or backstab all of us."

"With all due respect, sir, there is literally a hostile army parked in a hundred-mile radius around Mount Ebott. Not only would I _not_ ever be able to escape unseen, I would only be hastening my own demise by eliminating the enemy of my enemy. Also, I want my lab back."

"Ugh...that actually makes sense...fine. Come along, but try any tricks and you'll regret it."

* * *

"We will also need a few monsters to establish a command post in this ballroom. If any of you are skilled with healing magic, we would appreciate your help."

A few monsters began to tend to their fallen comrades' wounds, including Luna's own, with all manner of green-colored magic. They could not fully undo the visceral damage caused by the bullets, but they could at least ease the pain until the nightmare ended.

"As for the rest of you, find some cover, get comfortable with a partner or two, and start lobbing attacks at any enemies you see. And no matter how bad it looks, never lose hope. We will hold on for five more hours, and then reinforcements will arrive. They have pushed us out of our cities, they have pushed us across plains and rivers and mountains, but not a single inch more. Not today, not tomorrow, and not ever again."

Luna figured that he and the other lieutenants had a mountain of tasks by now, but the Dreemurr parents and their children were still standing before him with distant looks in their faces. Come to think of it, they hadn't requested anything of him beyond the nuclear presentation. Was it something he said, or perhaps some unknown faux-paus which earned him uncomfortable stares? He tried to reach for his mouth to pick out a possible chunk of food stuck between his teeth, immediately realizing that he _still_ had Asriel's body around his shoulders.

"I'm sorry about your son. It's a little cruel, to be honest; the restorative enzymes we used in that field are still working to save him from turning to dust, and yet, we couldn't save him after all."

The commander had to pause to wipe something from his eye. He knew he couldn't hold on forever, but he couldn't bear to let go of the prince either.

"If you don't want to fight, I understand and I won't think any less of you. You've done all you need to as commanders-in-chief; we'd be happy to handle the dirty work."

"What on Earth are you talking about?"

"Huh?"

"We will fight with you on the front lines, but if you could, perhaps, give us our child first..."

"Yes, of course."

Tears. Choked sobs. Even with the noise of the battle raging outside, he could hear their despair and loneliness reaching around his heart. Worst of all, the feeling was one he'd known for years.

"All you ever wanted was for everyone to live in peace again. You have sacrificed the most out of all of us, and this is how fate rewards you a second time? Wherever you are now, we'll miss you and treasure you forever."

"I just want to hold him again...to hear his gentle voice...why did this have to happen, Gorey? Why?"

"We'll make them pay, Azzy. We'll get our mountain back and then we'll go see the stars again, okay?"

* * *

 _*You equipped the Dark Energy Sword and put aside the toy knife. Hopefully you won't have to use it, but it's better to be prepared._

* * *

 ***Reinforcements in 4:15:00.**

Solemnly, Toriel beckoned, "Moping around is not going to solve anything, and it certainly is not what the monster who took it upon himself to shatter the barrier would want. We're ready now, commander."

Luna snapped out of his gloom and approached the queen, who began to talk in a hushed tone.

"I did not want to bring this up in front of everyone because it would have hurt morale, but I believe that the monsters who were not at the reception today may still be alive. Perhaps they have been taken prisoner, or better yet, they are in some sort of safe room and hiding themselves from the enemies. I must check on them."

"Now I'm really impressed, Your Highness. Truth be told, I didn't expect this kind of tactical prowess, and certainly not from you, Queen Toriel."

"In all honesty, Luna, I am every bit as surprised as you. My parents believed in the idea of strong rulers, so they scrounged a few military textbooks from our library during my princess years. I never thought I would have a use for them, but they still seemed interesting, so I read through them a few times cuddled up with Gorey under a warm blanket. I guess…with my baby boy gone…or because I can't stop thinking of him…all those diagrams and principles just started coming back to my mind. Strange, is it not? The only dream I ever had was to become a teacher one day, and this…I suppose, in a way, I am now teaching the craft of war."

"Tori…you are the finest queen our kingdom could wish for, and that is by virtue of your _kindness_ , not by military might."

One of them kissed the other on the cheek.

"Tell me, you two, does it ever feel unreal to you? As though all the battles you fight are nothing more than bad dreams?"

"I don't know, Your Highness. I really don't."

"Those books spoke of troops and maneuvers so impassively…watching it come to life and consume your home is…different, to say the least."

"I just want this day to end already…I…I just want to be alone. But, no…the others need us. Luna, there is a reason you were retained until you heard the rescue mission."

"Because it'll involve taking wormholes to several possibly heavily-guarded places in succession, right? Just tell me where and I'll get us there."

"Actually…we wanted you to look after Chara and Frisk. They seem to get along with you, and I know we can trust you to keep them safe."

"Pardon me, Your Highness, but wouldn't you rather make the most of my abilities? These claws are yours, and I—"

"Luna, you have been hiding that wound on your arm for a few minutes now. It feels painful simply looking at it from here. Please, we want you to rest up. You can always join us when you are feeling better."

"Okay, then…where to, Your Highnesses?"

"The first place I can think of is Snowdin Forest. We used to hike there, and it's large, open, and thick enough that a passerby wouldn't be able to tell if anyone was in there."

* * *

"So, this is the legendary barrier room," remarked one agent.

"Yes. It's what kept all of us down here for years. I'm glad it's gone for good now," replied a monster.

"I don't know about you guys, but I'd feel better if it was up right now. Then we'd be safe, right?" joked another agent.

"That isn't funny."

"Sorry."

"We passed a brick house labeled "New Home" a while back. If no one's moved in yet, why don't we use that to build our bunker?"

"Sounds like a plan."

All the monsters began to chip away at the house with various magical weapons, removing hunks of bricks and re-purposing them into crude walls, towers, and platforms. Feeling proud of themselves, they sent a message back to the ballroom base. One of the commanders there listened carefully and then reported what he heard to Luna.

* * *

"Dashing Dancer here; we've just heard back from the barrier group. They've built themselves a makeshift bunker out of bricks from some recently constructed house and they have the entrance secured."

"Bricks from a new home, huh? Tell them that I respect their creativity, but go easy on the property damage from here on out. And thanks for that code-name, by the way. We could all use a chuckle or two at this point."

Luna sighed. It didn't hurt much to lie down and breathe and stare at the brightly-lit ceiling, but the back of his mind was starting to itch. Surely, if another bullet didn't end him, boredom would. He craned his neck around in search of something—anything—to do. Perhaps the upper floors needed another sniper, or maybe Chara and Frisk would have liked another snack from the kitchen, or he could finally start catching up on his pile of paperwork, or—

Two head-shaped objects eclipsed the sparking chandeliers, at least one of which had been crying but was trying to be brave. Bored no longer.

"When do you think Mom and Dad will be back?"

"I'm sure they're almost finished combing through the forest. Any time now, they'll call for me to reopen the wormhole."

"Do you think they're okay?"

"One burnt ear says they can protect themselves. Hey, why don't we talk about something else?"

"But what if something's happened to them?"

"…"

"…"

"Darn it! Thought this babysitting stuff was supposed to be easy, but you two…"

"We should check on them. Can't you open the wormhole again? Please?"

"They said I'm not supposed to let out you out of my sight—"

"So, come with us!"

Luna sat up, took a deep breath in, and took a deep breath out.

"If I say 'no' right now, will you two have managed to sneak away by yourselves within fifteen minutes?"

"Yeah."

They were smiling a little bit, like they had _already_ done something wrong.

"I get it. Proving you can be strong goes far beyond putting on brave faces. You two stay near me. You two hide if I tell you to hide, and run if I tell you to run."

Luna opened a wormhole to Snowdin Forest, gingerly stepped in, and gave an all-clear by sticking a single claw back out of the vortex. Everyone else entered the swirling black and purple hole and found themselves stepping in a clearing of pristine snow, surrounded by trees in all directions. There was no trace of anyone having been in this patch in days, let alone an entire P.O.W. camp.

* * *

 ***Reinforcements in 3:30:00.**

"I don't see them here. Where else could they be?"

"Perhaps they're searching the town. If I remember the map, the plaza is definitely large enough to accommodate a few hundred monsters, and all of the buildings there have cozy fireplaces."

* * *

The lab was thoroughly ransacked, with papers and files scattered everywhere. Somebody had been looking for something, perhaps some prototypes to steal as part of the campaign against the monsters. But reorganizing would have to wait until the enemy was cleared from the rooftops. Gaster led the detachment up a flight of stairs and peeked through a crack at the bottom of the door. Several disembodied hands appeared and floated silently toward the backs of several humans.

"Now!"

Each hand grabbed a soldier by the neck, lifted them up off the roof, and threw them to their deaths with a single swift motion. At the same time, two agents kicked down an access door and stormed onto the roof, weaving around the concrete and bringing down artilleryman after artilleryman with precise lunges. A group of monsters filed in after them and mopped up the rest with a series of white beams and magical blasts.

"Like clockwork, G. But um...please never use that move again. It's super creepy, and this opinion is coming from a space alien."

The monsters high-fived one another and told the ballroom about their brand-new toys.

* * *

"Dashing Dancer to Luna, the detachment sent to Hotland has reported success in capturing the artillery emplacement."

"Not a good time, Dancer, um…tell them that they may re-purpose the cannons as they see fit."

"I did, but they told me that none of them actually knew how to fire the artillery. Unfortunate, it seems, we've taken heavy casualties and those pieces would have been useful."

"Oh no…heavy casualties…we've spread ourselves too thin. We'll return to the hotel immediately to reinforce. Just as soon as we find Toriel and Asgore—"

"Now wait a minute, casualties don't mean we've lost just yet. We've regrouped with some members of the Royal Guard; their commander is doing an excellent job drumming up morale and we're still holding them back. Backup also called, and they'll be ready in three hours, but first, they wanted to ask if any fire control orders are active."

"Have everything prepared except for the hypervelocity matter launchers."

"Are you sure, sir? The HMLs are their strongest armaments; if they can't use them, the battleship won't be as effective."

Someone behind him mumbled, "Hyper-what?"

"Excuse me for one moment. Dreemurrs, you're familiar with the lightbombs, correct?"

"Yes. You said they were made from the combined magic of a thousand monsters. Are they going to use one? Can we see it?"

"Um…I can't say right now, but the humans have been improving their weapons, too. They have a prototype called a rail gun—it's a big cannon that uses electricity to magnetize a metallic shell at thousands of kilometers per hour and crumples anything it hits like wet paper. Sometime after we devised the lightbomb, we had the bright idea of using that magical energy to launch a powerful missile instead of just firing the energy itself. Imagine a rail gun, only it shoots long, thin telephone poles packed with guiding technology instead of full-metal foot-longs. The only reason we're avoiding it is because the HML hits the ground hard enough to cause small earthquakes sometimes. For obvious reasons, we can't have earthquakes of any size right now, but rest assured that when the warship gets here, there'll still be plenty of pummeling."

"Did you hear that? There will be absolutely no kinetic bombardment of Earth. There are civilians taking shelter underground and their lives come first. Not only that, there are a substantial number wounded and even more missing. Abandoning our position here is unthinkable."

"Understood. Over and out."

Luna hung up, glanced at Frisk, and muttered a thank-you for lending him the phone. Frisk nodded and smiled in reply.

"By the way, where did you get this from? It doesn't seem to resemble any human technology we've studied so far, and I'm sure it's actually better than mine."

"The Royal Scientist. It calls. Also texts. But, I like the Laser App. Haven't tried shooting people yet."

"Please don't."

"What's the matter? I thought you were okay with us fighting alongside you."

"I know how horrific violence can get, and I'm somewhat ashamed to admit that my firsthand perspective started when I was younger than you are. Nobody at such a young age should have to see someone else hurt others, much less kill them outright…hey, I never said I was going to let you two fight with me!"

"But we're already out here, I mean, suppose we had to defend ourselves against a non-fluffy non-pushover—"

Luna sighed, feeling his cheeks turn one-third of a shade redder.

"Hmph. That didn't count. I wasn't ready."

"But we are."

"I know extreme circumstances call for exceptions, Chara, but I feel a little guilty for letting you and Frisk talk me into putting you two through this with your parents about two minutes away from you. Anyways, let's head to Snowdin Town."

The group trudged through ankle-deep snow and a few acres of forest before finding themselves behind a rock facing a large wooden building. Toriel and Asgore were taking turns peeking around the corner, eyeing a rather large group of soldiers gathered comfortably around a campfire.

"There is no sign of any captured monsters outside, " whispered Asgore. "If they're here, they must be in this inn we are sneaking around. This is the largest building in all of Snowdin and the only practical place to hold prisoners."

"Psst!"

Chara wadded up a snowball and tossed it in the general direction of the inn, causing her adoptive mother to nearly trip over backward when it splattered against the wood.

"Chara!" Toriel mouthed. "What are you two doing here? Where's Luna?"

The alien stuck his head above the rock and shrugged sheepishly. Very carefully, the three of them crawled their way over to the wall.

"Apologies. Turns out I'm a terrible babysitter. If you think about it though, they might be safer traveling with us."

"We get away from the exploding shells and get to watch the _coolest_ mom work her fire magic. Win-win, right?"

Toriel sighed. The day had been long and tiring; plus, they had at least as much grief to work out as she did.

Luna whispered something and summoned a shadowy sword. He tried to carve the back door away from its lock, but winced and quietly cried out in pain. No matter how intently he tried to ignore the bullet in his arm, it didn't change the fact that he was in no condition to wield a sword like that. Frisk carved the hole instead and Luna gently lowered the piece of wood onto the ground with his other arm. The five rescuers carefully stepped into the inn, with the king leading and the commander acting as a rear guard. They snuck their way through the building floor-by-floor and room-by-room, but not a single other soul was in the back of the inn. As the group made their way toward the front of the inn, Luna stopped them suddenly and gestured at a soldier sitting behind the front desk, obviously comfortable in the heated air of the building and oblivious to the monsters crouched twenty paces behind darkness.

"I'll handle this one. A fireball would give us away, and it would also be nice if you two looked away for a second."

Luna positioned his shadowy sword behind his head, tiptoed to mere inches behind the enemy soldier, covered their mouth, and telekinetically swiped the blade across their neck. Chara and Frisk naturally caught a glimpse of this after being told not to, and were a little frightened by how mechanically the commander did the deed. They looked on, breathless, as Luna rifled through the corpse for supplies and a grey automatic rifle before unceremoniously kicking the body into a wormhole.

"Do any of you know how to shoot a gun, by any chance?"

Everyone either shook his or her head or shrugged.

"It's too heavy for me and not enough to take on the horde outside by itself, anyway. Toriel, Asgore: you two go for the closest ones with your fire magic and I'll take out the ones in the back with a Flare. Chara and Frisk, I'm counting on you to use that red barrier thing I saw you do on the asteroid in case any bullets come too close. Ready?"

* * *

One agent lay on a towel stained with red liquid, clutching a bullet wound just above their stomach and writhing in terrible pain. Two monsters came to their side and examined their SOUL. They both whispered something, and as their hands began to grow an earthly shade of green, the injured SOUL resonated with the same color. Feeling a gentle warmth from their stomach, the goat monster started breathing more regularly.

"Thanks…that feels a lot better and…I really appreciate it…but I have to get back to the Ruins!"

The agent tried to get up, but winced and fell back onto the towel in a whole new world of hurt.

"You need to rest, okay? Let us handle this."

"You don't understand. It was ten of us in that house, and we were just about to take a squad of them by surprise, but they heard us coming through the hallway. They raised their weapons and opened fire, and we tried to defend ourselves with shield spells...but...but..."

"Shh...deep breath in, deep breath out. You're safe here; whenever you feel ready, tell us what happened next."

"The shields...they...didn't work...the bullets...they got five of us right when we turned around and tried to run back into the bedrooms for cover, and three more didn't make it. It was just me and our commander—they were slumped against a dresser trying to keep pressure on a wound in their chest and I was bleeding out on the wooden floor. Then we both heard footsteps from the corridor."

 _"They're coming. We don't have time. I'm hurt worse than you; I'll open the wormhole and you go through first, okay?"_

 _"What? You can't be serious—"_

 _"I am. You have a better chance of making it, but that's only if you go now!"_

"Before I could say anything else, they opened a vortex under me and sent me here. I didn't see them get through before it closed, so I have to go back for them!"

"I'm really sorry, but they're probably gone by now."

"No! Don't say that! Maybe you and your cave buddies are new to this 'war' business, but we _never_ give up on our brothers and sisters! Now let me go already!"

"You think _we_ don't know war and suffering? Have you forgotten about how we ended up in this forsaken cave in the first place? Yes, you're right, we should never abandon our friends, but since your head doesn't have a bullet in it yet, _use it_. There's no chance your friend hasn't been killed yet, and the last thing they would want is for their sacrifice to have been in vain."

The wounded agent covered their face with their paws. The monster was right; it would be foolhardy to go out even if they were in good fighting condition. Another commander passed the monster a communication device, who answered, nodded, and handed it off to the agent.

"Now talk to Luna if you really don't want to stay still."

* * *

"So, Dancer tells me you're practically killing yourself trying to rejoin the battle."

"That's exactly what I'm doing, sir! We've already lost the Ruins detachment plus another thirty of us to counter-snipers, and I can't let them do this alone!"

"Which is precisely why they aren't alone. They have you to cheer them on."

"Isn't there something more I can do to help them from here?"

"Yes, actually. My group just routed about 25 enemies, and we've looted all the equipment they left. I'm going to wormhole a pile of guns and ammunition and stuff to the ballroom now, and if you insist upon working through the pain, I could have you sort out the supplies."

"Yes, sir!"

Luna pushed a mound of metal and composites into a wormhole and asked Asgore where they should check next.

"There is a part of Waterfall called the Dump. It is a large cavern filled with trash that fell down from the surface."

"A smelly dump, hmm? Maybe we'll find some gas masks in there."

A wormhole to Waterfall opened.

 ***Reinforcements in 2:45:00.**

* * *

"Earth Office to Dashing Dancer: We've intercepted an order telling a fighter squadron to launch bunker busters into Mount Ebott. We're tracking the jets now and they're fifteen minutes away."

The ballroom commander slammed the podium in frustration.

"Curses! We can't shoot them down from here! Those missiles'll punch straight through the earth and blow us to bits!"

"We'll scramble any pilots we can to defend the mountain from above, but all of you down there need to brace for impact in case the worst happens."

Three starfighters jumped into a wormhole and came out full-cloaked just behind the human aircraft. Under each metallic pair of wings was a handful of small, slender, four-finned missiles surrounding a much bulkier, depleted-uranium-tipped rocket.

"Red One to Dancer, we have a visual on twelve hostile air units with twelve bunker busters. There's a pretty nasty lightning storm happening over Mount Ebott and the sky's basically being covered in flak right now. Our only hope is to decloak right on top of them. It'll be mass confusion, and with any luck they'll go down before we do."

All three pilots tapped on computer screens, color and apparent shape of their respective vessels gradually morphing into tangible objects.

"Holy…Raptor Four picking up three new radar signatures! Did anyone even see where they came from?"

"They're right on top of us!"

"Raptor One to all units! Engage those rogue fighters!"

"Red One to all units…you know what to do."

The leading starfighter opened fire, mangled the right wing of one of the warplanes, opened a wormhole, appeared behind a second jet, and tore that one to pieces too. Red Two and Red Three shot down three more fighters, but a shell clipped Red Two and sent them into a tailspin.

"Red One to Dancer: they got Red Two, but we're not losing hope yet!"

Red One baited two more fighter jets into pursuing them above the storm clouds and launching a volley of missiles, only to vanish into a dark vortex. Red Three appeared behind them shortly after and blasted their engines into dust.

"Five left, Red Three. Ready to make that promotion?"

Red Three gave a thumbs-up and dived through the clouds with their partner, chasing down another fighter. All of a sudden, a proximity alarm started flashing.

"Look out Three, there's a missile on your tail!"

Before Red Three could react, the missile collided into their spacecraft and engulfed it in a massive fireball. The resulting shock-wave sent Red One bouncing through the air as if they were on a Pogo stick, but the lead pilot regained control and could only look on as bits of their protege's wreck fell like raindrops.

"No! Not him!" the lone pilot thought. "You'll pay for that!"

Red One pushed the throttle as far as it would go and raced guns blazing into the last group of fighters. One jet exploded, followed by another, and another.

"One on one now..."

Red One gazed into their adversary's cockpit, locked on, and pushed two red buttons on the throttle. Much to their dismay, nothing happened. After being pushed to the absolute limit, the firing mechanism malfunctioned. The other pilot, meanwhile, recognized this moment of weakness and launched a large rocket at the base of Mount Ebott.

"Dancer, I'm jammed up here and there's a missile headed your way. There's only one thing I can do to guarantee it doesn't take thousands of lives."

"You don't mean..."

"Yes. I'm sorry. Even if I can shoot it down, it may have already armed itself. I know you didn't want to lose all three of us, but it's the only way to save them. Tell your ground forces to increase non-encrypted radio chatter. Trick them into thinking more of us are coming. Make our sacrifices worth more. And finally…promise me you'll keep those chimps' boots off my dust."

Red One pushed hard on the throttle, plowed their starfighter into the bunker buster, and forced it to explode before it tunneled into the ground. The ballroom commander closed their eyes and murmured a personal expression of gratitude.

* * *

 ***Reinforcements in 00:40:00.**

Meanwhile, Luna had reached the Dump and was hiding behind a mound of trash with the royal family. He heard footsteps coming from the far end of the room, and when he peeked over the garbage, he saw what looked like a blindfolded monster being pushed along by a soldier with an assault rifle.

"This is it, guys. The prisoners are here. Good thing Asgore—"

The crack of a gunshot echoed off the cave walls and pierced Luna's ears like a thousand needles. When the alien looked up again, there was a human, a smoking gun, and a monster splayed out on the floor.

"They killed them!"

"No! Wait!"

Luna leaped out from behind cover, sprinted to the soldier, and impaled him with a single sword stroke. Angrily, he shouted at the other soldiers, "Where are they? Where are the other monsters?"

But they didn't need to answer. Not five feet from the alien was a large pit filled with bloodied corpses and white dust, surrounded by the rotting smell of decay and the coldness of death.

"I knew it…'Z' was right all along…"

His voice grew so icy over the battle that it even tired of coldness, looping around to white-hot fury again. The soldiers didn't answer; there was nothing to say. By the time the screams stopped and the Dreemurrs came out of hiding, the commander was panting heavily and had his back turned to them. He wasn't holding a weapon, nor was there a discarded sword on the ground nor residue from a magical blast. Instead, all eight of Luna's claws were stained red and pools of liquid were forming on the ground below them.

Toriel walked up to the alien, put a paw on his shoulder, and asked, "What happened? Is everything okay?"

Luna turned around slowly, and Toriel jumped back at the sight of his face, white fur stained almost completely in various bits of viscera. The four human bodies around him were covered in quadruple slash marks.

"Good heavens! Did...did you do that to them?!"

"This is a mass grave, your Highness. They...they butchered each and every one of them as if they were animals. I'm sorry that you had to see me like this, but there's only one fate those soldiers deserved."

Frisk and then Chara caught a glance of the heap of dust and decaying bodies, felt sick to their stomachs, ran to a corner, and tried but failed to relieve themselves of magical lunches long absorbed.

"And after doing something like that, they still call _us_ the monsters?"

An odd mixture of despair and fury washed over Luna. Toriel tried to comfort him, but he brushed her arm aside, wiped as much of the blood off his face as he could, and stormed off into a deeper, darker section of the caverns.

"Where are you going?"

"Don't you have a battle to lead, your Highness?"

Soon enough, a wormhole opened, and the commander found himself in a tree on a forested path above the base of Mount Ebott, overlooking the human battalion responsible for guarding the nuclear device.

"Humans..."

Luna remained unseen. Few soldiers expected defeat at the hands of the heavily outnumbered monsters, so even fewer had been searching for his kind outside. Still, given his luck today or lack thereof, a lone sentry came wandering up the dirt track toward his hiding spot.

They were too nervous. The sentry probably spent the first few minutes on the path wondering how they fell into this mess—a topic they had plenty to think about after a rustling of leaves.

"M-monster!"

"Don't move. Shout and scream all you want though, as the others won't hear you."

Staring and not moving certainly counted as not moving.

"What? Surprised that we speak your language? Come on, you must be _dying_ to say something right now."

"What are you going to do to me?"

"What'd they tell you? That I'd take a bite out of your leg? Make a four-course out of the rest? Feed you to my little ones like a hawk? No, no, we'll be taking a short walk. I think it's _great_ weather to travel light, so you'll be leaving your rifle and assorted sidearms here. Right now."

Seeing the enemy come out of the mountain implied that all resistance between the CORE and the Ruins had been annihilated; that the entire detachment sent into Mount Ebott had been or would soon be lost. Unlike their awkward stroll, the second Human-Monster War was hurtling full speed into the endgame.

"Wait…this is the way I came from. Does…does this mean you're letting me go?"

"Looks like it. You want to save your friends? Run back and get the attention of someone with actual negotiating authority. Give them the following electromagnetic frequency. If I don't hear a message from this phone in the next fifteen minutes, negotiations are over."

About 12 minutes later, Luna's phone blipped.

"Hello? Is this the acting commander of the monsters?"

"Yes. Look up the mountain. Do you see me now? Great, because I can see you, and—seriously? Is it tradition over there to settle things at gunpoint? Do they think they can hit me from there?"

"You know how it is with new recruits and all. Anyway, you've made your point, okay? We'll retreat with this bomb and we'll never bother the monsters again. Just don't hurt anyone else!"

"The monsters, you say? All they wanted was to feel happy again. For my entire life, that was all I wanted to feel again, too. I've dreamed of the day I could see the light of the universe again, and now, you've taken the one chance I had away from me."

Luna looked at his feet as raindrops splashed on his head, running some of the dried blood off him like red rivers.

"But this isn't just about the monsters anymore. You've shown us that humanity is nothing more than a race of violent savages. All those monsters in the Dump surrendered peacefully as they'd done in the past, and you responded by mercilessly slaughtering them. Do you hear me? You killed all of them! Thousands! Have any of you any shame in what you've done? Is regret something that humans can even feel? And what about empathy? How do you think it feels to be a monster trapped underground until the end of time, and when they can finally go free, all they get is a bullet through the heart?"

 _"How can you even look in the mirror every day and call yourselves humans with pride?"_

"T-thousands? Of prisoners? That can't be…the orders were only to use as much force as necessary to contain the uprising."

"They're dead. Your troops seemed to be under the impression that they were supposed to kill to the last monster. I avenged them myself and the rest of your soldiers are at our mercy. If this is what it takes to start negotiations again, you should feel lucky we're still willing to talk at all. First question: why should we care for their lives when you clearly don't value ours? Why should we let them live if they'll just return to hurt us again?"

"But things have changed for the better up here. More progress has been made towards equality in the past few decades than in all of human history. We've made great strides toward ending poverty and hunger, and we sincerely hope we won't be remembered for our mistakes. There must have been a misunderstanding behind all of this; a misinterpreted order traveling down the chain of command, and if you could please find it in your heart to forgive us, I'm sure we could broker an armistice."

"You killed a little child down there."

No response. Nothing they could ever say would come close to being a sensible defense.

"This attack was deliberate, orchestrated, premeditated; _there was no misunderstanding_. Regardless of their orders, it was their unlawful actions that revealed the true face of our enemy. If you truly intend to put an end to the violence, then you will agree to the following terms."

(Our commanders discussed these with the Dreemurrs earlier…now, where did I put them again?)

"First of all, humanity will allow the surviving monsters to integrate into the surface world if they wish to and pass any legislation needed to protect them from any potential hate crimes. Second, humanity will allow the soldiers directly involved in this operation to be tried for their crimes against all civilization. These trials will take place in our courts because we're the victims whose homes have been burned down and whose families have been demolished."

"Okay, okay. Done and done. Just calm down and we can talk through this."

"Finally, humanity will disarm completely. Every branch of your military will be dissolved, every soldier will shed off their role as an instrument of destruction and adopt another one as an agent of peace, and every vehicle of war will be dismantled and repurposed for less hostile purposes. There is absolutely no reason why a civilization claiming to uphold peace needs enough devices to destroy its own planet thousands of times over, and if your words are sincere, you would have done this decades ago."

"But that would leave us completely defenseless! At the very least we'd need a token army to protect ourselves. And isn't it a little hypocritical for the mighty sorcerers to tell _us_ to disarm?"

" _We're_ not the murderers here, are we? This is a symbolic acceptance of nonviolence, and it's absolutely non-negotiable."

"I'm sorry, but we can't agree to a hundred-percent demilitarization."

"We _will_ track down each and every enemy underground, and you surface-goers will be next. If in the unlikely chance negotiations become possible again, you will _not_ be walking free in the end."

Someone fired, the figure dive-rolled aside, and someone in the crowd exploded into dark energy.

"I guess this means negotiations are over again."

Tanks formed ranks at the base of the mountain and fired a volley upward. The commander fled into a wormhole and reappeared higher up the mountain, blending himself seamlessly into the white snow like a chameleon. Explosions began to erupt indiscriminately from the snow-capped face as the cannons tried to track their elusive enemy, but the alien kept climbing until he could see the shells bursting only beneath him. Though out of earshot of the human forces, he muttered, "But that ends here. No more genocides."

No more hiding. A brilliant flash of lightning filled the sky as solid, dark shapes manifested high above the storm clouds. Enemy faces showed curiosity, then surprise, and finally, a mortal terror as the gravity of their fateful choice became clear.

* * *

Luna ? AT ? DF

*LV 20.

* * *

"You must realize by now, humans," the alien whispered, "that the first war happened a long time ago. Our mages have you outranged and our ships have you outmaneuvered. You so desperately wanted the _monsters_ gone; _we'll gladly fulfill your wish_."

A beam of light emerged from the belly of the cloud-cloaked warship and illumined the ground near the alien. When the flash subsided, there was a horned soldier clad in full gleaming power armor sans helmet. They took a glance at the human army and turned expectantly at Luna, taking special notice at his bleeding arm and face.

"Queen Toriel…King Asgore...negotiations have fallen through and peace seems impossible. The cavalry has arrived, but this is _your_ planet at the end of the day. It wouldn't be right to proceed without the blessing of the king and queen, so...shall we proceed?"

There was a pause, but ultimately, a deep 'yes' responded through the phone. After another pause, a female voice said the same.

* * *

*You can still dismiss them by retracting the positive identification of the humans as enemies, but this is your last chance. There will be no turning back after the battleship joins in. They'll seize control of the exosphere with naval weapons and fighters and all of Earth will be attacked at once. Lots and lots of people will die...but you've already made your decision, haven't you?

* * *

 _"Monsters deserve to burn, don't they?"_

The soldier nodded and beamed back into the warship. From space, the battleship nearest Mount Ebott fired a lightbomb near the humans' nuke, disabling the device and incinerating thousands of nearby humans. Luna put up his uninjured arm to block the light and warped away as the sea of burning energy rushed toward him.

* * *

"Captain! We've lost contact with the bomb squad!"

"Then our special weapon has fallen into their hands. Notify the other silos immediately."

* * *

A large ballistic missile fired its thrusters and soared high above the atmosphere. In response, a wave of fighters raced out of the battleship to intercept, pilots watching as the first stage detached—then the second stage—then the third, until, near the apex of its trajectory, the missile fragmented into a singular warhead surrounded by a cloud of inert decoys. In the few minutes before the cloud re-entered the atmosphere, the pilots successfully destroyed every fragment whether harmful or harmless.

With the surface reinforcements eliminated, the raging battle underground soon deteriorated into an unusual reverse hunting expedition, with roving bands of monsters combing their ruined homeland for human stragglers and the occasional carrier ship depositing much-needed supplies through the Barrier room. Finally, able to rest a little, the survivors had made excellent use of the ballroom to throw a small feast for themselves.

" _Burning Sky_ to Luna: we've neutralized a long-range warhead travelling towards Mount Ebott. From the bits and pieces we recovered, it looks to be another hydrogen bomb. We've also traced the missile to its silo and rendered the installation inoperable with another lightbomb, but that's more concerning than not."

"What's the matter?"

"Their satellite communications suggest they're about to launch _five_ more. Another lightbomb is being charged now and is predicted to neutralize one before it leaves its platform, but that still leaves four and the fighters had enough trouble intercepting one by itself. In the event of a failure, you have between fifteen and thirty minutes before impact."

"Understood."

Luna hung up, gently tugged on the king's robe, and whispered something into his ear. Asgore stood up and rapped his claws against his glass.

"Can I have your attention, please? We are, if you can still believe it, experiencing an emergency and need everyone to begin moving towards the laboratory. Please grab your children and follow the nearest lieutenant in an orderly fashion. There is plenty of room in the lower levels, and, as I am sure you will all be happy to hear, we have fully repaired the lab's air conditioning system."

* * *

Twenty-three minutes and nine seconds later, a streamlined metal object scraped the summit of Mount Ebott and detonated, releasing a sun-eclipsing flash and a gigantic fireball almost the size of the mountain itself. The pressure wave erupted in all directions, stripping trees of their leaves and reducing acres of grass to charred ashes. What was left of the abandoned towns had been swept away like dust by a strong wind.

"Good grief…we felt that cataclysm all the way from up here. Hello? Could someone down there answer us? Please?"

"This is Toriel…we're safe. We're all safe."

"Thanks to your expedient evacuation, Your Highness. As expected, we've retraced the warheads and eliminated their launch points. The fighters have been deployed in full force and we're discovering more silos and airfields every hour."

"Luna said something about radioactive fallout earlier. Will…will that hurt us?"

"Good news and bad news. The bomb detonated with such force that it caused Mount Ebott to cave in on itself, creating a seal of solid earth that will shield the Underground from most of the radiation. Unfortunately, a large radius around the mountain is still contaminated, and you will all need to stay down there until the radiation reaches safe levels."


	15. Rain

"Welcome, Luna. Come in; make yourself comfortable."

Nuclear attacks were never included under "Excusable Absences," apparently. The alien sat down in front of a graciously borrowed Hotland Laboratory monitor for a video conference. Across the "table" were five imposing goat monsters in hooded robes, sitting in similar chairs themselves and arranged in a semicircle around their visitor.

"You are undoubtedly here to deliver your report of the events that transpired recently on ZY-Delta. Unfortunately—or fortunately, depending on your situation—the other commanders have already made public the facts of the Battle for Earth. We'd like you to tell us what we _don't_ know. How would you characterize the results of the operation?"

"A…qualified success, sir."

"'Qualified?' Your detachment successfully held its position against far superior numbers despite not having artillery or a supply chain. Those conditions are hardly 'qualified'; in fact, they're impressive. Even with the help of the other commanders, we expected our side to be taken prisoner rather than the other way around. What made it 'qualified?'"

"It's the casualties that are bothering me. I failed to reach them in time. If I had leaned on a more offensive approach, we could have saved many of those monsters in the Dump. The humans had the guns, but I may as well have been the shooter. Is that really a success in our books?"

"Commanders have to make difficult decisions, Luna. Not always will you have time to save everyone, and in this case, protecting the monsters in the hotel was tactically sounder than spreading your forces thin chasing hostages. You would hardly be penalized for that aspect of the operation."

"I understand."

"On the other hand, a more interesting decision was your unauthorized use of the _Burning Sky_. On what planet do you believe it is acceptable to steal battleships for your personal use?"

"It just kind of happened. We wouldn't have survived without their help."

"You 'kind of' dragged us into war against the humans, and a war where our cruisers were exposed to nuclear weapons, no less! How are we supposed to explain this egregious breach of protocol to the public? Do you believe that the lives of monsters taking shelter underground justified thousands of our own?"

"No, sir, but there were so many wounded…so much destruction…I didn't want them to suffer any more than they had."

"Therefore, you decided to have our soldiers suffer on their behalf."

Luna froze. They had him surrounded in every aspect of the word.

"How does rashness look on you? On the integrity of this division? If you were a standing commander, you'd be facing an inquiry for certain."

Luna, defeated, buried his head in his paws.

"So, be careful next time."

Luna looked up.

"'Next time,' sir?"

"Yes. Your first operation takes place right back on ZY-Delta. Details have been posted to your files."

"Thank you, sir."

* * *

Strangely quiet weeks passed, both above and underground. No one on Earth seemed much for conversation, but still…she had to try. Frisk picked up her cell phone and dialed a number from its logs.

"Ordinary Offices Organization, how can I help you?"

"Luna? Are you there?"

"Oh! You must be Frisk. Sorry about the act; you must understand if Earth's gotten a bit more...dangerous in these dark days. I'll relay you to Luna in a moment."

"Hello?"

"You! How'd you even get my number?"

"How's that arm?"

"Eh…it's getting better. Really wish the clinics here had some of that stuff we gave him years ago. Doctors kept going on and on about how I should have lay down after being struck by the bullet; how foolish it was to fight with that kind of injury even if there are _much_ worse ways to be hurt...if you want to talk a little longer, I'm actually by the patch of golden flowers in the Ruins right now."

True to his word, the alien commander, trapped Underground as much as anyone else was, was sitting in front of a field of golden flowers, fur bathed in equally golden light shining from a candle he had set by the other end of the patch. His arm was bandaged where the bullet landed. A few minutes later, footsteps began to echo from the door.

"Hey, kid. I've been meaning to tell you something else that happened between the M.B. and me."

"You quit the M.B.? But why? Your team looked so happy with you around."

"What? No, I didn't quit. The other commanders were so impressed by my handling of the Battle for Earth that they made me a commander too."

"I don't understand. Weren't you already?"

"All but in name, Frisk. Our training's weird; they don't tell you when it's over and when your test actually begins. That way you're always at your best until they say you've got the job. All that bloodshed, and I got of all things a promotion to remember it by. However, that doesn't change the fact that a good leader doesn't lash out and lightbomb a planet just because he lost someone."

"Asriel?"

"Since that rescue mission, I could feel that there was something odd about this monster. It was almost as if that kid was a star, continuously radiating with joy and warmth and light everywhere he went. You know fully that I spent the greater part of my childhood with only darkness and destruction as my companions. I couldn't let anything happen to someone like that, someone who reminded me that there was more than coldness to the universe. I suppose this whole time I've been telling myself that I have to save others when I've really been trying to find someone to save myself. When I finally found that someone, he was ripped away from me, and I guess I snapped after that."

* * *

Luna HP: 213,000 DT: 2%

*LV 20. You never thought about it, but human opponents would probably be worth a lot of EXP. Even so, you're both amazed and a little frightened at the same time.

*Trying hard to pretend everything is okay.

* * *

"They buried him here with these flowers, but I guess you knew that already. They were around when I first saved him, so it's only right that he gets to wait here until I get to save him again. I'll visit this place every day, and on one of these days, something different is going to happen."

There were two monster feet-shaped indentations where he currently stood and a slightly worn trail leading to the only exit.

"Look at these flowers, Frisk. The monsters cultivated some, and some blew in from the humans' world, but deep down, they're all the same. They're all sharing this field and this patch of sunlight in harmony. This isn't just a resting place for Asriel, but also for all of the humans...and..."

"...and..."

"...a peace that should have happened instead."

A few red drops splashed against one of the flowers.

"Are you hurt? I'll go get a bandage!"

"Is it blood, Frisk, or is it tears? It doesn't make much of a difference now, does it? This whole mess was all my fault. I just had to feel sorry for this kid and be the one to save him. I just had to remain around this planet to keep checking up on him and his friends as they waited under the barrier, caring more and more about him as time went on. I just had to dodge at that last moment, and now he's dead. I should have taken that bullet for him. Maybe it would have killed me, and maybe it would have landed in my arm like this one, and if it did kill me, the other agents would have taken command of the whole war thing. Asriel would still be alive, and they would have probably let the humans surrender without killing everybody. Some hero I am."

Frisk hugged the alien, who returned the favor and started sniffling quietly into her shoulder. Even though both Asriel and Luna were capable of giving warm, fluffy hugs, the human child managed to outshine them both. Luna found himself unable to let go, leading Frisk to stroke his head gently as if he was an injured puppy.

"Please don't beat yourself up too hard. You did what you had to do. You helped save us."

"But—"

"I should have raised the shield faster."

"Don't even try, Frisk. This entire mess is my fault and there's no way I'm letting you take any responsibility at all for a terrible war. Every single human who perished did so because of me and me alone."

That statement was even less true, but he refused to let go of even a shred of responsibility. Frisk tried a different angle to patch up the alien's injured heart.

"It's not all bad! We can rebuild. We can go to the surface as we please. Sans and Papyrus are hosting a lot of community-building events. Undyne found the ruins of a rec center. Alphys and Gaster split the Royal Scientist job. They work on confusing things together. Mettaton still likes being Mettaton."

"And, um, a few of your agents rebuilt the Earth Office at the summit of Mount Ebott so they could visit us often. See? Everything's okay here!"

The commander's investigative sense tingled as he finally backed out of the hug, kneeling a short distance from Frisk.

"Is everything really okay?"

"Of course! Mom and Dad even changed the laws. No more wars."

Unimpressed with the answer, the alien stared intently at Frisk.

"Mom and Dad...they haven't been themselves. They're always smiling and laughing around the other monsters, but I can hear a deep sadness in their voices. Chara and I try to cheer them up, but they keep saying everything is fine. Maybe they're trying to cope, but there's always this pained look deep within their eyes. But they aren't angry at you, and they know you tried to make the best out of a bad situation. They just miss their son, and there's nothing we can do except struggle through the bad times together."

"Frisk, I appreciate you trying to cheer me up; really, I do, but I have something else to tell you."

"Over these weeks, the enemy launched hundreds of nuclear weapons near the _Burning Sky_ and it reacted as you'd expect when nuclear weapons crash into your front porch. Only one of theirs hit its mark, and that's astronomically fortunate for us, but the same can't be said for the humans. They met the wrong end of many, many lightbombs."

"Is that our problem?"

"Lightbombs are fast. They must be, or else they'd never hit anything. When a lightbomb hits, it, as the name suggests, sometimes looks like a beam of light straight from the heavens. Anyone who didn't comprehend our technology would certainly mistake that as some kind of divine punishment. Long story short, riots have broken out and I can't tell you how the world will look once the radiation subsides."

"Those agents, bless their enthusiasm, are not building an office, but actually a waste management depot. Three guesses who got the unenviable task of supervising high-tech latrine duty. We want to clear this fallout from the war as soon as possible, and after that, what's left of Earth will belong to you and your friends."

"No...I...Frisk...your friends...what have I done?"

The human reached out to comfort him, but he jerked away from Frisk's hand as if it was made of fire.

"Don't touch me! I did so many horrible things up there...hurt so many people...I don't deserve your kindness. I probably doomed humanity to extinction...wiped out all the friends you had before you fell down here...there's no way you don't hate me, isn't there? Go on! Tell me about how I've ruined your life forever; how everything would be better if I never escaped from the alleyway!"

None of his increasingly incoherent attempts to punish himself worked; in fact, his pathetic begging for retribution only made Frisk hug him more tightly, ever more determined to nurture his broken heart.

"But you didn't ruin our lives! My friends are here! I've been trying to say that all along!"

"But...but...they...I..."

"Shh...you don't have to bear the burden alone, Luna. Even if you keep kicking yourself down, I'll always be here to pick you back up. No matter how long it takes, I won't let go until you understand we're glad that you came here."

"You…you're really good at this, aren't you?" the alien sniffled.

"Sure," Frisk replied, "Take all the time you want; say whatever you need to say…oh, what's this?"

The human reached into the alien's pocket and pulled out a locket, golden chain and heart-shaped body shimmering in the sunlight. Etched into the heart was an 'A' and a five-pointed star.

"This must be the locket Asriel wore…I must have taken it from his neck without thinking, but I think your parents would really want to see it again."


	16. Mercy

Frisk LV 1 999:99

Chara LV 7 999:99

*The monsters are free again and for good this time. There's an entire world up there to explore and nothing strong enough to trap them underground ever again. You could go up and bathe in the sunlight with your family once the radiation is cleared. Maybe it would help take their minds off him. But the thought just doesn't seem to please you. This should be a good ending you've reached with the alien. You won. The bad guys are no more, but it just isn't time to celebrate.

*As for your companion, you feel that it would be a miracle if he was ever the same again; you aren't sure if he'll ever move on from taking care of the garden. You tried to let him keep the heart locket, joking that Chara didn't need another one, but he insisted on returning it to you and your family.

*There must be some other way for the monsters to coexist with humanity. After talking with Chara, you two decided it was worth the risk.

* * *

The whole world began to spin like a movie being rewound. In every country, the warships that rained death and destruction over human cities now acted as miraculous vacuum cleaners, absorbing magic from ruined cities and restoring buildings. Starfighters, flying backward, pulled downed missiles out of the ground as the missiles themselves, like reverse chisels, reconstructed Mount Ebott out of scattered earth. Every bullet and light blast found its way back to the device that fired it, reviving the fallen along the way.

"You don't have to do this!"

"We're just following orders, buddy."

"But—"

The same sniper fired at Luna. This time, however, he had dodged _toward_ Asriel, and at the same time, Frisk dived into his waist and knocked both of them to the ground. The bullet zipped high over the human/monster pile and embedded itself into the bridge with a dull thud. Several more rounds followed, but with a vague idea of which direction the bullets were coming from, Luna got out a hasty finger quickly enough for Frisk to summon a strong partial shield in the only direction that mattered. Under its protection, the monsters began backing themselves toward the safety of the hotel, either by walking or by scooting awkwardly along the paved stone.

Taking care to stay behind the translucent, red hemisphere, Luna raised a faintly glowing paw and, in a single swift motion, jerked his opposite toward the bridge's edge. The human lieutenant caught the rails in time to avoid an instant fiery demise, only to look up and lock eyes with two incensed goat monsters and their own version of fiery death. In fact, the only direction _not_ punctuated by fiery death seemed to be the way they came from.

"This is the second time you guys have tried to kill the prince. At this rate you'll all end up getting a taste of Hotland's prime export."

"Filthy monster, how dare you threaten a human!"

Luna stood up, brushed the brown dirt from his clothes, and demanded, "Who authorized this attack?"

"We'll never tell you!"

"Who authorized this attack?"

"Go jump in a lava pool."

"Tell me! Now!"

"Never!"

A faint purple blaze appeared around the alien as he grimaced and began to charge an inky ball of energy in his other paw. The bridge couldn't have been that strong and his side was practically inside the hotel lobby already.

(Blac—)

Asgore grabbed Luna's paw, receiving one mystified glare in return.

"Humans…regardless of your opinions of my subjects, at least allow us the privilege of just one answered question. Look at the hellscape around you. The suffocating heat of the magma waves, the smell of burning sulfur…how many of you truly wish to be down here right now?"

"It's our job. What do you care?"

"You have obviously gone to great lengths thus far, having fought your way through the undying resistance of countless guardsmonsters. Now, you stand face-to-face against a harrowing chokepoint that will more likely than not be fatal for each and every one of you."

The perplexity faded from Luna's face, replaced by a grin and a quiet chuckle.

"Don't you get it, lieutenant? The hostile terrain, the mysterious enemy, the forbidden superweapon, the newscaster promising that an entire war would be over in a week…your commanders sent you chasing after your own deaths! They would have you muddle through this suicide mission and then use the bomb to destroy the evidence of your great battle!"

"Hogwash! You destroyed the barrier to invade our world, and we're here to defend it! They'll be throwing parades for us when we're done here!"

"Then where is this 'invasion' your superiors spoke about? All I see is a bunch of monsters huddling in fear of _you_ invading _our_ world! You think you'll be remembered as heroes? You'd be lucky if the history books paint you as murderers, let alone give you a page at all!"

"We do not wish to fight, human, and neither do you. You know it in your heart that your lives were meant for greater deeds. Lay down your arms and you will not be harmed."

It worked, Luna again genuinely impressed by the charismatic king and shrewd queen's gambit. A wave of clattering spread through the cavern as hundreds of long rifles dropped onto the dirt.

"Come on, now. Show us how to put this pointless war to rest."

"It's the U.N. Security Council. They're the ones in charge of the United Earth Government's military. They're holding a summit in Switzerland and they told us to get rid of the monsters."

"Thank you. One other thing: where are the prisoners?"

"I don't know what you're talking about."

"We're not idiots. It's several hours of walking from the snow to the magma and every stop along the way is populated. I sincerely doubt your troops just smiled and waved to them. Where are you keeping the monsters who aren't here right now?"

"Hmph."

Addressing the other commanders, he said, "Make sure that the whole world knows not to do anything hasty. In the meantime, I need to have a little chat with this one, commander to commander."

 ***Reinforcements in 9:30:00.**

One of the goat monsters picked a soldier at random and sort-of-gently escorted them outside and toward the base of the mountain. When they arrived, the monster without so much as a spoken word nudged the soldier toward their comrades and headed back up the mountain again. Luna wormholed himself and the lieutenant to a nearby island and asked about the missing monsters again.

"We've just let one of your troops go free. As we've said, we've no intention of holding captives and I'm not going to hurt you for the information I need. I won't beat and bloody you, I won't shatter your fingers, and I certainly won't wheel in some nightmarish machine to do it for me. Some civilizations are actually better than that."

"..."

"Instead, we're going to play a little game. Look around, and you'll see that we're on a little piece of rock whose fifty-meter cliffsides lead only to boiling lava. I can teleport on and off this island whenever I wish while you can't. They didn't tell you much about your enemy's capabilities, did they?"

"..."

"Your friends aren't going to help you because my friends are in charge now; in fact, your friends will be joining you shortly. It's a little difficult finding places to hold people when all the buildings have burnt down."

A small fraction of the soldiers entered or were "encouraged" into a wormhole leading to a different island.

"When you want to talk, just say so. Here, take a complimentary beverage."

Luna wormholed away, returned with an ice-cold glass of water and a piping-hot cup of tea, took a long sip of the water in the lieutenant's face, set down the tea, and left again.

"Hey! Leaving me here to die looks a lot like torture to me!" they shouted across the ocean.

"Die? Whatever do you mean? I've left you a free cup of His Majesty's Golden Flower Tea. I do recommend staying hydrated in these conditions, but I suppose you're right on one count—that tea really is to die for. Only problem is that it's fresh from the hot kettle, but that's okay, right?"

The alien waited by the bridge, slightly amused at the angry, swearing human bouncing up and down on their private island. Now that the immediate threat was over, he noticed Dr. Gaster pulling Frisk aside and joined them.

"Frisk, something in the magical energy field seems amiss, and all of the trails lead right to you. It's almost as if space-time has bent around itself—you wouldn't happen to know anything about that, would you?"

The child, caught red-handed, managed to respond with an unconvincing, "Um..."

"Actually, don't answer that. I don't want to know. It'd make my equations a lot easier if time travel continued to not be possible, but if you actually can, _and you definitely know if you can_ , please understand that you two risk triggering a vacuum metastability event. The high energy concentrations created by bending the flow of time could trigger the quantum tunneling needed to—"

"Doctor? Smaller words? Please?"

"Ah, yes, um…if you and Chara play with the timeline again, you could rip a hole in the universe, which will then expand at the speed of light and destroy all of us."

Frisk nodded.

"You must have had some vitally important reason to mess with the timeline, but I want to make sure you understand this: _Do not_ interfere with the flow of time from here on out. This is _not_ the kind of space hole magic can stitch up. No matter what happens to me or Asriel or anyone, it's too risky to fix the problem temporally. No matter how bad things get in the future, we'll just have to manage as best as we can."

Frisk, now completely terrified, nodded as sincerely as anyone possibly could.

"Oh…don't cower like that…scientists like to make things sound scary and Gaster's especially good at that. You didn't break the universe this time, so continue not doing that and everything will be fine."

Luna seemed satisfied and returned to the island each hour with several more boiling cups of tea, switching to hot water when Asgore ran out of golden flowers. This charade repeated itself several times until the lieutenant finally lost their patience and told the alien all about the monsters being held in the Dump.

 ***Reinforcements in 0:30:00.**

"Thirty minutes? It's time already? Dreemurrs, I know that you're going to say something like us needing all the help we can get, so you're coming along too. The Carrier is outfitted with stealth fields, but we're still flying straight into the hornets' nest. Get ready for a fight."

Asriel called for help. The six human SOULs came to his side, and along with Frisk's determination, their power transformed Asriel into the oh-so-familiar God of Hyperdeath. The commander, six agents, and the Dreemurrs walked to the entrance of the Underground and boarded a large, full-cloaked object, which took off for Switzerland. Asriel opted to fly behind the vessel instead, threatening to down any unfriendly human aircraft chasing them.

"Proximity alarm's going off and there's a pack of missiles closing in from one hundred twenty-five degrees CC. If you wouldn't mind, Your Majesty?"

"Shocker Breaker!"

Trails of lightning raced around the countermeasures and shorted them, causing their inert fuselages to plummet like stones. Stopping the Carrier above the building, Luna and company entered and demanded that the front desk tell them where the summit was being held. The receptionist pointed nervously to a wooden double door down the hallway.

"Let's go. Breach and clear, just as we all practiced."

The aliens lined up against the wall on either side of the door, waited for Luna to give the wood a solid, backward donkey kick, and filed crisscross into the conference room. The chamber itself was a multi-level semicircle, with a presentation screen on the far wall and three curved rows of polished wooden seats around a central podium. On the left of the screen was a flagpole with a furled white and orange flag; it was hard to tell under the folds, but the orange seemed to form a design against the white background. On the right was the opposite—an unfurled light blue flag with white logo in the shape of a world map surrounded by two olive branches. Inside the room were human representatives from different countries and a terrified camera crew in the far corner. Apparently, the Security Council was using the projector to give live reports of their "Second War on Monsters" before the sudden intrusion.

The commander declared, "The Chair will recognize the representatives from the Monster Kingdom."

"Monsters! Shoot them!"

At the sound of those words, everyone who had a weapon reached for or summoned it, culminating in an armed showdown between roughly ten monsters and exactly zero humans. Luna grinned and remarked, "Your security's a little tied up, but no need to fear for your lives (yet). We just want to talk to you and borrow your camera for a moment."

"Why haven't any of you called for backup yet? Get these flea-ridden creatures out of here!"

"Hey! Who are you calling 'flea-ridden'?"

A different representative stood up, replying, "You, you dumb animal. Now why don't you go back to the zoo you belong in and stop bothering the important people?"

The soldiers at Mount Ebott may have been rough around the edges, but that one remark was the boiling point. There was a crackling discharge, and a magic bolt embedded a scorch mark into the table mere inches from the speaker's hands.

"You are exactly the reason we usually toss around the name of 'human' with contempt. I'm going to say this in a certain way because there are children here."

"Hmph. What could a monster possibly have that's worth saying—"

As subtly as possible, Luna opened a paw and gradually pushed on a representative, shifting their center of gravity just enough for them and their chair to tip over as if the goat monster was trying to win a game of reverse Jenga. Much to his amusement, the other unsuspecting representatives rushed over to right them after hearing them crash to the ground.

(Sir, don't you think that's a little excessive?)

(They're active enemy commanders in a state of war with us! Plus, they called me flea-ridden!)

(Still…a cease-fire would be beneficial for all present parties.)

(Right. I shouldn't let them get to me; their end goal is probably negative press against the monsters. If so, then let's take full advantage of those cameras.)

"It's unbelievable, the level of toxicity your so-called civilized society is capable of. It disgusts me that fully grown men and women must be told this, but you have _no_ right to treat _us_ like animals just because _we_ do not _look_ like you. Just because _we_ do not have human _faces_ does not mean _we_ lack human _feelings_. _We_ were _afraid_ when the mobs arrived at _our_ doorstep. _We_ were _devastated_ when they killed _our_ friends and family and _shocked_ when they kept going, deciding that their actions were no more severe than the butcher's behind the deli counter. When _we_ were sealed underground, _we_ _hoped_ for a better future for our children and _dreamed_ of a world that would appreciate _us_ as equals. Clearly the reality has not caught up yet, but we're going to at least hold a functioning dialogue today—as equals, mind you—without devolving to violence again."

There was the strange choice of pronoun again. The M.B. was still concealing itself from the humans, but it felt more natural each time.

"Fine. Now, who are you and what do you want?" asked the chairman.

* * *

Chairman 55 AT 40 DF

*This one didn't insult you, but told the incapacitated security to shoot at you earlier. You aren't sure if that makes him better or worse than the others.

*In charge of the UEG's military and therefore the one responsible for the attack.

* * *

"I'll be glad to answer, but first, I want that camera. One of you, get it."

This retort got under the chairman's skin, but with several spear-toting agents in the room, he was helpless to give any protest. Chara grabbed the camera from its human operators and focused it on the commander and his allies.

Luna looked directly into the camera and asked, "Every second of freedom we've spent watching and learning about this planet. No matter how much we research, there's one question whose answer still eludes us. Why are you so wholly incapable of coexisting with a race that you share a planet with?"

"You monsters attacked us and now we're simply trying to defend ourselves," responded the chairman.

"Fair enough; I see how shattering the barrier could be misinterpreted as the first step of an invasion, but you're hiding a lot of the whole story there, don't you agree?"

An agent took the projector and uploaded documents from the case file detailing Asriel's rescue onto the camera feed. Televisions from every corner of the world broadcasted clear images of the humans beating the prince to death as well as audio of the village guard yelling "Just let that thing die already!"

"The events unfolding before us have taken place while the barrier was intact. They posed absolutely no threat to the surface world, and yet, some of you had the brilliant idea to go after our young ones. Not only that, any history book would be happy to remind us how it was humans who struck first and struck last."

"But that was countless years ago. According to those same history books, the humans attacked out of _fear_. Is that not natural for any of nature's animals?"

"That hardly justifies how the first war unfolded, and it's completely irrelevant to this one! You had an obligation to keep the world safe and control of a military capable of doing that, and yet, you stood aside and watched two children nearly die. What do you have to say to the human audience now? Does the great United Earth Government now condone mob violence and Murder Two?"

The chairman's face began to turn a bright shade of red, implying that the UEG had been less than honest with describing past human-monster relationships. Stammering and fidgeting with his tie, he grasped for a credibility-saving explanation.

"Well, it doesn't matter who attacked whom first. Monsters are a threat to humanity for as long as they exist. People of Earth, would you honestly feel safe at home if some fireball-lobbing creature lived across the street? Would you want to send your children to a school full of monsters armed with who-knows-what kinds of sorcery?"

"Throw around that 'threat to humanity' moniker as many times as you wish. The bottom line is that the UEG attempted a genocide by atomic weapon and then tried to justify it by painting two children as a nonexistent invasion force."

(And there's obstruction…and several flavors of conspiracy. Keep talking; the world is listening and we've only scratched the surface of the Bureau's intelligence.)

Luna wasn't entirely convinced that the chairman's justification wasn't another iteration of portraying his allies as savage beasts, but back-and-forth discrediting could only accomplish so much. Not so skilled at diplomacy or politics himself, he signaled to Asriel, who reverted to his adorable child self. Recognizing the plan, Chara focused the camera on Toriel, Asgore, and their son.

"This is my son, who is obviously a monster," Toriel explained. "According to your leader, those floppy ears are a 'threat to humanity.'"

(I know this appeal works better with Asriel, but…he's not the _only_ one with floppy ears...)

"Next, you humans will probably declare war on all of your farm animals because a diet with too much red meat is also a 'threat to humanity,'" Asgore quipped.

The chairman's face now resembled a swollen tomato, flustered to the point of being unable to offer a rebuttal. Finally, Frisk took center stage before the camera.

"I'm a human just like any of you. And you know what, those monsters were probably the nicest creatures I ever met. After falling into their world, they housed me, fed me, and treated my injuries with no questions asked. Some of them didn't even notice that I wasn't a monster like them. Sure, a few of the monsters made mistakes, but I always forgave them in the end."

A tear formed in the corner of Asriel's eye upon hearing that last sentence.

"Ladies and gentlemen of the jur- ...erm, world, I ask you to think back years, decades, if you can: When was the last time a monster did anything bad to you or your family? Did it really happen or was it just another scary story?"

Murmurs of "Never," "She's got a point," and "Why are we even fighting?" spread throughout the round table. Billions of viewers on their couches concurred.

"Are you all serious? Do you all even realize how absurd this is? You're talking politics with monsters! Feral beasts or not, they're still evil creatures, the whole lot!"

"Is it really fair to punish them when we don't even agree on a justification? Is this really the first impression we want to show them?"

(You tell 'em, Frisk; you never know _who_ out there might be watching…)

The murmurs around the round table grew into not-so-quiet whispers and light discussions. Billions of viewers had risen and were now standing before their televisions.

"Why are you all listening to a bunch of animals?"

"Monsters might look different, but they aren't so unlike you and me. Don't they at least deserve a chance? It isn't too late to spare them," Frisk concluded.

In all likelihood, the chairman was as susceptible to rumors and paranoia as anyone else, but the alien still took a certain offense to his words. Luna had heard enough to decide that the chairman refused to listen to him after all. He drew a sword, but before he could swing it, a voice from the left side of the table announced, "Argentina motions for an immediate armistice and discussions to secure an everlasting peace with the Monster Kingdom."

A voice from the right announced, "Canada seconds that motion."

"France agrees."

"Kenya agrees."

"China agrees."

The chairman, composure far from regained, declared, "The motion does not carry! Have you all lost your minds? You're negotiating with a bunch of dirty creatures!"

"So even after all that, we're still 'dirty creatures'?"

"Mr...Monster Lieutenant? Captain? Warlord?"

"'Warlord?' Hmm, haven't heard that one before."

"Now that the Security Council has had the opportunity to see the monsters and their peaceable nature, we would like to apologize for our superior's intolerance. Believe me, we know that this behavior is shameful for this day and age, but nobody had ever come forward with any recent events about the monsters besides the broken barrier. Members of the Council, I'd like to call a motion of no confidence against the sitting chairman."

"What?! You can't do that!"

"Please allow our security to remove the unruly chairman from the premises before he embarrasses us any further."

Luna nodded, and three officers dragged a kicking and screaming man out of the building. A fraction of the representatives, apparently not wanting anything to do with the monsters either, followed their leader out in a huff. Two chairs were brought to the front by some of the remaining human representatives, despite their leader's distant, faint protests.

"Well, Your Highness, it seems a chair has just opened up. It would only be proper for you and your queen to have a seat with us on this historic day. It's time to arrange a peace already far too long overdue."

"Now this scene...this is more like it. You all sat down together at one single table and look—nobody died! You're drafting a treaty together and nobody had to be beaten to a bloody pulp this time! We truly want to believe in humanity, you know; clearly it'll take a lot of work but this one moment proves it's possible, doesn't it?"

"Yes...indeed...um, first order of business will be to have all field commanders and their forces stand down immediately."

The human leaders sent for a messenger, who received a note from the representative closest to the door and ferried it to a different part of the building. At the same time, some of the battleships eased their grip around the Earth, withdrawing from the outer reaches of the atmosphere to the Moon's orbit.

"Next, any prisoners held by belligerent powers should be returned to their homes unharmed."

Luna called the ballroom to inquire about the status of the monsters being held in the Dump. Fortunately, they were all still alive and the negotiations continued without derailment.


	17. Dawn

Luna stepped through the glass doors of the UNSC building, stopping in the middle of the outdoor plaza. Framed by paved walkways was a small garden of red and white flowers the alien took great pleasure in smelling. Birds were chirping, his comrades were merrily talking among themselves and taking the warships back home, and the sun warmed him to the deepest voids of his core. Acceptance wouldn't roll over the world overnight, but with the chairman removed, they were a great leap closer to a world where they could live without fear. All that was left was for a handful of pilots to take the royal family home. Luna climbed into his newly reconstructed space fighter with Asriel and took off for the cloudless skies.

"We did it! No one needs to fight anymore!"

(Even I saw the Security Council playing the scapegoat card…dump all the blame on one member and amputate them to save the others. But, still…he looks happy.)

"Heh…we really did."

Looking over his shoulder, he asked, "So now that that mess is settled, I'm pretty sure that I've earned a day off. Asriel?"

"Yes?"

"I believe you still owe me one tour of the Monster Kingdom."

"Okay!"

Enthusiastic as usual. A starfighter landed near the mouth of the cavern that once contained the barrier. Out stepped the two, walking past a patch of grass, rectangular indentation marking where a weapon of mass destruction once stood. It was strange to imagine that this peaceful grassland, empty and quiet save for a gentle breeze, was three times a war zone. The alien turned toward the entrance nearest New Home, but his companion grabbed his arm and tugged him toward a less travelled dirt path.

"Actually, it wouldn't be fair to Frisk if I showed you the _normal_ way in. You came from the outside, so you're going to do what she did to get in."

Asriel ran up a trail leading to the summit of Mount Ebott, with Luna following closely. Eventually, they reached a second cave that whistled as wind from the outside blew between the rock formations. There were toothy stalagmites and stalactites, strange plants and insects taking shelter in the sunlit patches of earth, and a breathtaking chasm at the very end. It was no wonder how this work of nature managed to lure in curious people six different times.

"Frisk told me they fell into the Underground, so I guess you just jump in?"

Luna looked at Asriel with disbelief. The chasm must have been at least a twenty-foot drop, although an inviting golden light shimmered from the bottom.

"Well, I suppose a fall isn't going to kill me at this point."

Luna swallowed and leaped feet-first into the darkness. A few seconds later, horrific snapping and crushing sounds echoed back up into the cave. He had missed the flower bed by a hair, clipping a bed of solid rock on his way down.

(Ow...really should have thought that one through...)

With a splash of yellow, Asriel landed right in the middle of the flowers. They were all perfectly normal and none of them showed any signs of being a homicidal maniac.

(Oh, come on...the prince nails the landing, Frisk gets it...what ever happened to beginner's luck?)

"Are you okay? I didn't hurt you, did I? Maybe this was a bad idea and I should have just stuck to the normal entrance."

As unpleasant as the impact sounded, the alien didn't seem to be in any substantial pain beyond some soreness around the ankles. Luna carefully stood up, brushed a few patches of dirt off his face, gingerly took a few steps, felt relieved that nothing was broken, and started walking around at a normal pace.

"I survived your horrifying rainbow death laser to the face, kid. I've been cut, burnt, kicked, shot at, and everything in between. Trust me; I'm fine."

The two continued through a doorway whose arch displayed the Delta Rune and ended up standing before an open area. In the center was a pile of red leaves and a cloud of fine particles resting on a patch of distorted space, which was flanked by two grand staircases leading to yet another doorway. This was the true entrance to the Ruins, but before they went through the next gateway, Luna reached out to touch the distortion. When his paw drew near, it reacted with a violent shock to his wrist. While he rubbed at the sore spot with his other paw, his electronic device took a note of the strange, light-bending object.

 _*Having the chance to experience Frisk's story right before your eyes fills you with determination. Unfortunately, you lack the sufficient amount of determination to SAVE here._

"Oh? That thing? Chara says it's a SAVE point, and it looks like not everyone can see it. It'll heal any bumps and scratches you've racked, but only if you're the most determined being in the Underground. Chara used to use it a lot, but then Frisk started using it too. I guess with both of them around, you can't really get much use out of it."

(So, this is part of the "time machine" Frisk more or less confessed to using. Strange; I don't feel any dark-energy distortions coming from it though. I guess this means those two have only used this one to patch themselves up. If only those two can see it, let alone harness its power, it should be in safe hands for now.)

The two continued into the next room, where six floor switches guarded a locked door. Luna stepped on the switches randomly, causing the door to not even remotely open. He tried to "un-press" the switches out of the ground, but the mechanism wouldn't budge no matter how many times he grabbed them with his magic.

Sheepishly, he whispered, "Um...I may have just broken your door. Now what?"

"If you step back into the previous room, the switches will reset themselves and you'll get to try the puzzle again. The monsters really got into puzzles to pass the time, so you'll be seeing plenty more after this one."

"Actually, I don't particularly fancy puzzles. Let's just wormhole into the next room and I'll try the next one."

Luna snapped his fingers and opened a wormhole in front of the door. Stepping in, the two found themselves on one end of a long corridor. The corridor was divided by two canals spanning the shorter distance between the walls and two little wooden bridges over each canal. On one of the walls, there were three switches and two of them had yellow writing inviting passersby to activate them.

"So, what, do I just move these two here?"

Asriel nodded. Luna made a grabbing gesture and moved two of the levers, causing the spikes to retract smoothly into their sockets.

"Well, that was easy. Wait, I hear someone coming."

Two monsters walked and floated into their path. Without thinking, the alien raised an arm to shield Asriel.

* * *

Froggit 30 AT 24 DF

Whimsun 34 AT 12 DF

*Froggit...croaks happily.

*Whimsun...waves "Hi."

*No need to hide the kid; they have no real reason to attack your fluffy face.

*You won! Gained 0 EXP and 0 GOLD!

* * *

The pair of locals passed them without so much as a hostile thought, leaving Asriel looking surprised.

"Frisk told me she had to fight hundreds of monsters as she explored the Underground. I guess that all had to do with her being a human, but it _just_ wouldn't be an authentic tour without fights. Hey! Froggit! Wait up!"

Luna put a paw over Asriel's mouth.

"Shh...it's fine. I'd honestly prefer if they didn't want to fight me."

After some more wandering around, the two found themselves in an S-bent room with cracked tiles everywhere. Listening carefully, the duo heard a faint whistling emanating directly from the floor. It was likely thin, porous as a sponge; furthermore, the air current must have originated from an empty chamber underneath their feet. Against his better judgement and being prodded along by the other, Luna tapped the first tile with his foot and left a goat monster-shaped imprint as he crashed through the floor. Two seconds later, a crinkling echoed through his silhouette; Asriel peered through and saw his counterpart lying face-first in a row of red foliage. Plastered on the wall beside him was a rickety wooden sign reading "Please don't step on the leaves."

At least he was correct about the hidden basement.

 _*You sigh and wormhole yourself back to Asriel._

Asriel and Luna carefully meandered around the cracked tiles, eventually entering a room with another golden star, a table, and a moldy piece of cheese glued to the wood by its own decomposition.

 _*Seeing this cheese makes you feel hungry. You could probably magic up something to keep yourself going, but when was the last time you had a proper meal?_

Much to his stomach's discontent, the alien had to refuse the slightly decomposed dairy product. Luckily for him, the air a few steps away started smelling like freshly baked pastries.

"Hey, what does that spider web say?"

 _Spider Donut- 7G Each_

 _*You placed a handful of golden coins in the web. At least, you would have, if you actually had any._

The two proceeded donut-less to a room with three purplish, whitish, Roman-style pillars. Each pillar concealed either a red, green, or blue switch beside it. Luna muttered and grumbled as he tried several unsuccessful combinations of switches before giving up and going into a corner to sulk. Asriel sighed and adjusted some of the switches, completing the puzzle for the disgruntled alien. The two entered a room with a large, ashen tree with red leaves. Behind the tree was a comfortable-looking house, but all of the lights were off and the floor felt as grimy as the walls reeked of mildew. Evidently, no one had lived here for quite some time.

"This is where Mom lived after she left Dad. If it's okay, I don't really want to spend a lot of time here because it reminds me of..."

"Don't worry. There's nothing for them to fight about anymore. Besides, I bet it'll take both of them just to take care of you three; something tells me you're all the adventurous type—always thinking up plans and getting into all kinds of trouble, and I like that. There's something I have to do first, but we'll get out of here as soon as we can, okay?"

The alien disappeared into one of the bedrooms. After a few minutes of rummaging and rifling, he emerged clothed in a _very_ different outfit; under the scarf was a flowing, purple robe with Delta Rune insignia and long white sleeves.

"Um, why—"

"It's a disguise, kid. I noticed the last time around a few of the monsters were a bit intimidated by our usual dress, so it couldn't hurt to blend in a little."

"Okay, but isn't that for, you know…"

"It was the only thing I could find without breaking into and burglarizing other monsters' houses…stop judging me, I've done stranger things before. Now is that pie I smell?"

Luna walked into the kitchen, stopping to wonder why someone would abandon a perfectly intact, fully-furnished house with the honor of having served the queen. For whatever reason, she had left in a hurry: on the counter was a humongous butterscotch-cinnamon pie with one slice carved out.

 _*The size of the pie would intimidate a human child, but you feel fine trying a bite._

With a flick of the wrist, the alien commander summoned a magical sword, carved a small chunk from the abandoned dessert, skewered it through the middle with the blade, and then popped it into his mouth.

He regretted that choice immediately.

"Ew! It's dry and moldy!"

Asriel giggled as the alien tore up the kitchen looking for something to cut through the rancid aftertaste. He tried the tap, and when not a single drop of water flowed out, he rummaged through each and every disappointingly empty cabinet and freezer.

"When I fought Frisk, she had a slice of that pie in her inventory. That pie must be really old!"

Hearing that clearly didn't help. Luna bolted down the stairs and through the basement, coughing and dry heaving along the way. The prince tried to keep up, but caught a glimpse of the door at the end of the tunnel slamming shut as the alien fled into the next biome.

"Wait! Don't go through that door yet!"


	18. Door

Emerging from the exit of the Ruins, the duo found themselves in a snowy forest. Asriel immediately started playing in the snow, but Luna simply looked relieved to have enough snow around to wash out the last chunks of rotten pie. After asking the prince to warm some up and swishing several bottles' worth, he started poking around the door with a puzzled look. He didn't quite remember how he forced it open from inside, but it didn't seem to have a handle on the outside.

"I need to go back for a second. How do you open this door?"

"Oh, you can't open that door from the outside."

"What do you mean I can't open the door? I left a light spear on the counter when I was tasting that horrid practical joke of a pie and I need to get it back before someone finds it and hurts themselves."

Luna snapped his fingers repeatedly, trying to open a wormhole back to the abandoned house, but nothing happened. He banged impatiently on the door and sliced at it with a sword, but still nothing happened.

"For the love of..."

* * *

The Ninth Human 95 AT 15 DF

* * *

Luna snapped his fingers again, disappeared with a purple flash, and reappeared a second later.

"Interesting. It seems I can still wormhole to that ledge where we fell in here. It's only this door that's somehow interfering with my powers."

"So why didn't you just go into the Ruins again and grab the spear?"

"There's more than that, kid. I've trained for years with magic. I've practiced fighting styles for all ranges and situations, whether I'm alone or at the head of an army and I _still_ couldn't defeat an inanimate barrier. With all due respect, your Highness, _don't you ever_ tell me that I can't open something ever again _._ "

"Wait. If you're that good with magic, why do you even need a spear in the first place?"

"Magic is finicky sometimes. I'd like to not be completely defenseless if that happens, and, honestly, it's they who keep making us carry these things around."

The alien stepped back from the confused prince, produced a small vortex, and fired a purple bolt at the door. The impact of the magic against the stone knocked some dirt off the surrounding stone wall, but the door remained unbroken. Even at the exact point where the projectile landed, there was not a single scratch on the door's surface.

Next, the alien found a screw on the ground and tried to bore a hole through the door, figuring that concentrating a hefty amount of pressure onto a tiny metal point would crack the barricade open like an eggshell. Instead, the screw bent and deformed into a lump of metal against the hard stone of the door.

Luna noticed a nearby sentry station with its guard nowhere in sight. Where there was a tool shed, there must have been tools. Searching around the shack, he borrowed a spear to use as a chisel while telekinetically swinging a tree branch as a hammer. A professionally crafted steel weapon would certainly be able to withstand the stress, he figured, and the screw he used earlier was probably just too weak for the job. After a few minutes of arboreal assault, he splintered the branch and bent the spear, but still didn't destroy the door.

Not even the strongest of metals resist crushing under pressure differences, so the same principle must apply to whatever matter the door was made of. The alien moved every particle of air away from its near face, creating a vacuum on one side while leaving normal atmospheric pressure on the other. When the door didn't buckle and crumble towards him, he created a tiny black hole near the door to not only increase the pressure difference, but perhaps weaken the frame by ripping individual atoms away. Not a single atom did so much as consider moving.

Luna asked Asriel to do a little bit of fire magic into a small area of the door, hoping to melt his way through. Unsurprisingly, they failed. The alien decided to recruit another person, phoning the Earth Office and asking them to wormhole in a scientist fresh from the laboratories. The scientist examined the material of the door, made a trip to the lab, and returned with a tiny sample of the door's corresponding antimatter substance. He gently placed the antimatter on the door, wincing in expectation of the inevitable mutual conversion to energy, but to both of their surprise, the door did not react with the antimatter.

The scientist retrieved a shiny, expensive drill and tried to bore through the door again. The drill sputtered, started smoking, and died along with the rest of the laboratory's budget. With nothing more to lose, the scientist applied strong acids and strong bases to the door in an attempt to corrode it. The solutions dripped off the door and ate through some of the snow instead. The scientist applied two electrodes to the door and administered a strong electric shock because the two were running out of ideas at this point. Of course, nothing happened.

Exasperated, Luna and the scientist tried asking nicely for the door to open, even throwing a few adorable ear flips to try and win the door over. Doors don't have ears.

"Sir, it seems this door truly is impossible to open. I trust we'll be getting reimbursed for all of our pain and suffering?"

"Yes, of course you'll get your fancy drill back. But puzzles at every corner sandwiched by mockeries of physics? I can't imagine how Frisk is still alive right now."

Slightly dejected, Luna wormholed back to the beginning of the Ruins and made his way back to the house to recover the weapon, but the lance was missing.

 _*The M.B. is totally going to kill you for this._


	19. Snow

"I'll break down that door yet," Luna grumbled, rejoining Asriel on the path through Snowdin Forest. All around the two were evergreen trees, fronds covered in a thick, seemingly permanent layer of snow. An icy wind blew, ruffling the prince's fur while sending chills down Luna's spine. He fidgeted with the scarf, trying to create a makeshift blanket while complaining, "How was it so warm in the Ruins and so chilly down here?"

Asriel grinned.

"Magic?"

"Okay, anyway…are you cold? Should I give you my scarf?"

"No, this is great!"

"Agreed. Just need a little time to adjust."

The two stopped before a wooden barricade, although it was rendered useless by a man-sized gap right in the middle of the grid of logs. From behind one of the logs, a skeleton in a red scarf sprung out to confront the two.

"Greetings, your majesty! It is I, the Great Papyrus! And who might your clone in the starry cloak be?"

"Oh, this is Luna. He isn't from around these parts, so I'm showing him around the Kingdom. We're going to see everything from the Ruins to the CORE and everything in between."

"Well, any friend of the prince is a friend of mine. Anyway, you two must be very busy, so just follow me and I'll show you a shortcut past all of the puzzles."

"Wait, Papy. I really want to show my friend everything there is in the Underground. Give him all of the puzzles Frisk got, and make them extra hard."

Luna made a face at Asriel, but Papyrus didn't notice.

"All righty then! I'll go and reset all of the puzzles, and of course, what tour would be complete without a fight against the Great Papyrus himself?"

Papyrus eagerly ran off into the distance, leaving one content goat monster and one slightly annoyed alien monster standing by the barricade.

(No. Please. Mercy.)

Passing a rather disheveled sentry station that smelled faintly of ketchup, the duo rejoined Papyrus in front of the first puzzle. It looked like a rectangular sheet of shiny metal, as if someone had screwed a steel foundation into the ground and never bothered finishing the rest of the building. Luna tapped it with his foot, noticing that it wasn't nearly as ice-cold as he expected given the weather and it sounded hollow, as though something was installed under the metal plate.

"Behold! The New and Improved Electricity Maze! Just find your way across, but be careful, one false step and you'll fry!"

Asriel asked Papyrus, "Didn't Luna need to hold an orb or something for it to work? Frisk told me that's what she had to do."

"Nope! Now, the maze will shock you even if you don't have the orb!"

Luna cautiously took two steps forward, followed by a step to the right. The moment his foot touched the plate, an electric spark shot up his leg, knocking him on his hind end. This pattern continued a few dozen more times as the alien stumbled his way through the maze, the only difference each time being how high he jumped in response to the shocks. Asriel waved his paw around his muzzle and complained of the burnt monster smell.

"Well done! You may now proceed to the next puzzle!"

Luna found himself before a mini-golf course of sorts, with a snowball at his feet and a hole roughly fifty meters away. Patience wearing thin, he squinted at his distant target, took a deep breath, and telekinetically batted the ball into the hole with a single fluid motion.

 _*You felt your inventory getting fifty gold coins heavier._

"Can I get something to eat now? Wait, never mind, there's spaghetti."

Papyrus had left a plate of spaghetti on a wooden table as a sort of distraction, a particularly effective one against a peckish goat monster. On the table was a note that said, "Unlike the other puzzles, my spaghetti can't possibly be improved!"

Luna tried to take a bite, but the provided silverware clanged against the frozen-solid spaghetti, making a noise more akin to a tuning fork than a dining one.

"Asriel, could you warm up this spaghetti with your magic?"

Asriel summoned a fireball near the spaghetti, and the noodles started bubbling faintly and steaming, but there was a flash and a spark and the fireball ignited the entire wooden table and the spaghetti in the process. By the time the two were able to douse the fire with some of the snow, both table and spaghetti had been burnt into charred black embers. Luna tied his scarf around Asriel's ears and started yelling something.

This time, Papyrus was waiting with an electronic-looking floor roughly the same size as the charged plate from earlier. On his side was some sort of computer control for the digital floor, interface populated with a grid of circular red buttons and a slot machine-like arm attached to its side. Luna couldn't decide if this puzzle, in all its complex bulkiness, was more or less advanced than the others.

"Next up, the Random Puzzle Machine! When I pull this lever, all the tiles in front of you will change color randomly, creating a puzzle that has never been seen before! To make this extra hard, I won't tell you what _any_ of the colors do!"

According to Frisk, Asriel remembered, the RPM was defective and only ever spat out a single ridiculously easy pattern: a straight walk through the center of the electronic floor. The prince didn't expect any entertaining errors from his companion this round. Papyrus pulled the lever, causing the floor in front of Luna to flash wildly. When it eventually settled down, every single tile lit up with a lime green despite the skeleton suggesting there were multiple colors.

Luna didn't know why Asriel looked excited all of a sudden, but the prince remembered Frisk saying that green tiles summoned monsters to fight the puzzle-goer. According to the sheet of green in front of him, the alien had a full-scale brawl to prepare for. He had no real choice but to step on some green tiles, but the monsters that were supposed to be summoned to fight simply smiled, waved, and carried on with their lives.

"Well done, Asriel's clone. Clearly, I have underestimated your puzzle-solving skills!"

Asriel snickered to himself. With the right amount of luck, even randomly flailing around could pass for proficiency.

"For your final task, you must face...The Gauntlet of Deadly Terror!"

Luna stepped near a long wooden bridge, only to come face to face with cannons, sharp spears, flamethrowers, and swinging spiked balls all pointed menacingly at his pristine, cannonball-free, not-flaming face.

"Psst! It's a bluff! Frisk said she walked straight across; the Gauntlet's all bark and no bite!"

The alien took the prince's word and took a step towards the cannon. The moment his foot touched the bridge, there was a bang; a solid iron ball flew a foot over his head and landed in the trees below with a thud. Without a word, Luna crouched into a sprinter's starting pose and took a deep breath in. He could hear his own heart pounding like that cannon and he wasn't sure if Papyrus was trying to kill him with this latest "puzzle", but then the click of the cannon reloading pricked his ears. He exhaled and took off full speed toward the skeleton at the end of the bridge.

The cannon fired again. Luna ducked.

A spear swung down from the left. Luna dodged right.

The flames from the flamethrower roared at his feet. Luna jumped, grabbed onto the chain of the rapidly approaching spiked ball, and dismounted right in front of a speechless skeleton. With a silent grin, he reached for the mechanism and powered off the Gauntlet. All the traps and weapons retracted into the cliffsides and ceiling, clearing the way for an awestruck prince.

"Whoa! How'd you do that?"

"Hey, 'Azzy'…it wasn't a bluff."

"Amazing! You have survived every puzzle that I, the Great Papyrus, have thrown at you! The last challenge you will face in Snowdin is a fight with yours truly. Just walk to the end of the town when you are ready."

Despite the liveliness of Snowdin and the many things Asriel wanted to show him, Luna headed straight for Grillby's and ordered 10G worth of coffee. Just as he started tucking into his warm drink, a human child he had never seen before sat down at the bar next to him.

"Hey, kid. What's that you're holding?"

 _*You noticed that the child had a lance in their hands._

 _* Your lance._

"You found my weapon in the Ruins, next to a pie, didn't you?

The ninth human nodded "yes."

"You aren't going to hand it over, are you?"

They shook their head "no."

"Please?"

But they refused.

"Pretty please?"

But they refused.

 _*You fashioned a cool-looking star out of dark energy and offered to trade with them._

But they refused.

 _*You swallowed your pride and did the unthinkable, offering to let the human pet you if they gave it back._

Somehow, against all odds, the human refused.

"Well, if you're going to keep it, I may as well show you how it works before you hurt someone."

* * *

Light Spear AT= 95 +0 DF

*Should not be thrown from shoulder height; rather, the Velcro-like grip and metal body and prongs are perfectly designed for a monster to use as a two-handed lance. Unnaturally light in your hands to compensate for monsters' relative lack of physical strength, it feels like you could twirl it over your head like a helicopter.

*Stores magical energy from the wielder as an electromagnetic field between the two prongs, which then collects a cloud of plasma as air comes into contact with the charged metal. This matter-energy complex is virtually indistinguishable from a standard magic attack, can be fired like a crossbow, and takes on the same color as the wielder's SOUL.

*The prongs are currently glowing a faint crimson.

* * *

"I'll let you keep it for one day, as long as you don't hurt anyone. Do we have a deal?"

The ninth human nodded in agreement, and then ran outside and started blasting a lot of expensive-looking private property.

 _*You groaned and followed the trail of burn marks, leaving notes offering to pay for the damages as you went along._


	20. Escapades

Luna rejoined his companion outside of the restaurant, satisfied and disappointed at the same time.

"Well...good news is that I found the spear. Bad news is the human who just walked out found it too and won't give it back."

"Are you sure it was a good idea to let that human go by themselves with a high-powered space weapon?"

"Don't worry about it; no one will get hurt. When I saw the excited look on that child's face, I knew they would have moved mountains for a chance to play with the spear. They're not going to throw their fun away by doing something foolish, and besides, it's only as strong as the energy you can focus into it."

"But was it really such a good idea to teach them how to use it?"

"The only thing more dangerous than a human with a weapon, Asriel, is a human without the good sense to use the weapon properly. They obviously aren't going to start intentionally blasting random monsters down after sitting down with a full bar's worth, but if I didn't teach them, they could have accidentally hurt somebody with the greatest of ease."

Asriel and company walked toward the end of Snowdin Town, wind roaring as the air around them gradually thickened with snow. As the weather reached blinding blizzard conditions, the two, tucking faces into paws and scarves, walked straight into Papyrus.

All visibility returned immediately.

"Prince Dreemurr. As a royal guardsman-in-training, I must report that a human has been spotted heading into Waterfall. I tried to stop and fight them, as our rules demand, but they just ran right past me with a cool-looking toy in their hand. But I see your friend is here, so I will make up for not fighting the human by fighting him _twice_ as hard!"

A nearby tree was on fire. Luna hastily doused the tree with water from a nearby river and then entered a combat stance.

* * *

Papyrus 64 AT 16 DF

*Wearing a "battle body?"

*Thinking of something called a "blue attack."

*What's a "blue attack?"

* * *

A near-undodgeable volley of blue bones appeared behind Papyrus and launched themselves toward Luna, who instinctively tried to move out of the way and therefore took damage from the blue attack. In retaliation, Luna produced a sword and lunged at Papyrus. While in midair, his SOUL suddenly felt as heavy as concrete and he fell face-first into a pile of snow.

"You're blue now."

The alien's SOUL glowed no longer a usual pristine white, but rather a deep sapphire. Snapping his fingers to no effect, he shouted, "What…what is this?! I can't approach you anymore; it feels like I'm stuck in a really long cage!"

(Can't wormhole either…and there's a lot of hurt coming this way…)

A series of white bones of various lengths slid toward the commander from the left and the right, which he dodged with a series of jumps. Luna dematerialized the sword in exchange for a black orb of the same material and launched a flare at Papyrus, followed by a healing orb. Asriel looked confused and raised a paw, as if wanting to say something.

"Why are you looking at me like I don't know I'm not supposed to help the enemy? If I hit hard enough to go toe-to-toe with you, I could accidentally kill this monster with one attack. Granted, I'm calm enough to make sure my attacks don't bring him below half HP, but it's better safe than sorry."

Several large walls of blue bones approached Luna from behind. Even though the attack was physically impossible to dodge in two dimensions, Luna tried anyway and got knocked down by the first one. The rest passed harmlessly through him while he was lying motionless in the snow.

(Ow…So the _blue_ attacks don't hurt you if you stay still. Wonder if it has anything to do with what that smiling skeleton did to my SOUL…)

Luna tossed another flare followed by another green orb. Papyrus responded with another wave of blue attacks, but Luna, having observed the secret to the skeleton's magic, held a taunting pose and stayed still while the attacks passed by.

"Are you challenging the Great Papyrus? Well, medium-sized Asgore, now you'll face my special attack!"

Papyrus summoned hundreds of bones, which began to fly at Luna from all angles like crazed hornets. Even though the bones were starting to hit him, Luna raised his paws and shook his head like Asriel did to Frisk. It was a complete guess at a taunt based on seeing the first Earth monster do that, but the gesture seemed to deliver its intentions in full. Papyrus started summoning more bones at once. Luna made another rude face, and Papyrus summoned even more bones.

(That's it...keep summoning them...)

"Your puzzles are boring!"

(Keep going...)

"Your spaghetti tastes like old socks!"

Papyrus, now straining himself, summoned bones at maximum speed and quantity.

(Gotcha. Now let's check your stamina, shall we?)

Luna dispelled any blades, black holes, and other weapons on or floating around his person, directing all his focus into dodging the tsunami of bones as well as he could. Several of the blunt missiles impacted against his covered back and defensively-raised arms, but still he evaded the brunt of the hail. Soon, it became apparent his gambit paid off: Papyrus's volleys began to shrink in both quantity and speed until finally, a single three-inch bone crawled weakly along the snow and lightly bumped the goat monster's white foot.

* * *

Papyrus HP: 129,571/180,000

*Papyrus is sparing you.

*Totally not because he's losing or something.

* * *

"I was just kidding about the spaghetti thing. It actually looked rather tasty. No hard feelings, okay?"

If he could ever be offended in the first place, Papyrus didn't stay angry for long. He gave a beaming, forgiving smile despite the alien smacking him a few times with his cosmic repertoire seconds ago.

"Well done, friend of Asriel! You may now proceed to Waterfall, but if you ever want some more spaghetti, just come back to Snowdin and I, the Great Papyrus, will make you all the spaghetti you could want!"

"Thank you. Before we depart, Asriel, I'd like to ask you a question about the monsters in general. Is what just happened how a typical fight with a monster proceeds?"

"Papyrus is...well...he has a lot of heart and plenty of enthusiasm, but he could never even think about hurting anyone. A lot of the monsters are like that too; they're comfortable with using magic, but it'd take nothing less than a life-threatening situation for our magic to actually come close to killing somebody. Kinda explains how we got our tails handed to ourselves by those villagers, huh?"

"Is that so? It sounds like the humans have little to fear from the barrier being gone. But when we 'paid a visit' to the human leaders, they were talking as if the monsters were some kind of terrible danger. Looks like I should investigate the where and why of this lingering mistrust."

"But you're going to do that later, because it's your day off like you said earlier and I still have stuff to show you!"


	21. Reflection

The duo waved goodbye and trekked ahead, snow under their feet gradually thinning out and becoming hard, bluish rock. The caves ahead echoed with the sound of trickling water and every so often, a droplet formed on the roof and splashed against their fluffy heads. The bright light reflecting off the white snow faded as they went deeper into the caverns, being replaced with a bio-luminescent blue glow from the walls themselves.

"On to Waterfall, I suppose. No doubt the ninth human is already halfway through. By the way, Asriel, you've known Frisk and Chara for a while. How are these two humans so much faster than anything I've ever seen? I mean, Chara was actually moving faster than my dodging at some point, and I have a good chance at dodging a bullet as long as I know where it's coming from. Even though they're kids, they could probably take me in a fight."

"Before they fell into the Underground, they were already very determined beings, but they didn't know it yet. After meeting us, they learned about magic. They understood the power of determination a lot more and learned to use it to make themselves faster and stronger. I don't know if all humans can do that, but those two really are special."

Asriel didn't need to tell him twice. The alien remembered his moments on the asteroid; everything from being forcibly introduced to hard space rock at high speed to being flambéed by rainbow death ray to, most vividly of all, nearly being decapitated by a supersonic human with a sharp knife while another human with apparent magical ability watched.

Luna and Asriel found another sentry station, roof on fire and smelling faintly of ketchup. All they had to do was keep following the trail of burned breadcrumbs, and at the end would surely be the pistol-packing human. Soon after, they stumbled upon a river and four nearby lily pads floating in the water. Marked with a single pink sprout and diameter the size of an average human, it was obvious that they were meant to form a natural bridge across the creek.

"Actually, this river isn't very rapid, and I can just swim across."

Asriel climbed on Luna's back and the duo waded across the river, leaving both of them soaking wet. As is required of anything with fur that gets wet, Asriel shook himself dry and splashed more water on the alien. Ahead was a vast, bowl-like section of caverns, floor crisscrossed with small streams and domed ceiling peppered with fluorescent dots. To the alien, the panorama almost seemed like an observatory. There was the right proportion of twinkling light to darkness, and a good variation in size among the false stars, but it seemed to be missing a certain element of depth.

"This next room is the Wishing Room. If you look at the ceiling, those rocks shimmer just like shooting stars and monsters would come here to make wishes after we got trapped underground. Every day, Chara and I would come here and wish for monsters to be free again..."

Asriel's voice trailed off. This place reminded him a time when it felt like sunlight and twinkling stars would never exist again. Changing the subject, Luna pointed at a tall, six-petaled electric blue plant and asked, "What is that?"

"Oh? That's an Echo Flower. They repeat the last thing they hear. Since these are in the Wishing Room, you'll probably hear some of the monsters' wishes if you tried."

"Is that so? If these flowers can actually do that without needing batteries and circuits, I'd like to take a closer look. Could I borrow one?"

After the prince picked one and handed it to his companion, the two knelt by a bunch of the remaining flowers and listened intently.

 _I wish the barrier was gone, so we could see the Sun again._

 _I wish for the humans to be nicer to us. I wish they could see that we aren't all bad._

 _I wish for the wars to stop, so we don't have to keep fighting anymore._

 _I wish for Asriel to be happy again. If I could cheer him up, it would really make all of the other monsters feel better._

The last wish, made by Chara in secret, was more than enough for Asriel to break down into quiet tears, overcome with all of the pain of the monsters at once. Luna knelt down and patted his head in his best attempt to console him and spoke softly, "It hurts, doesn't it? Look, I'm not going to pretend that things ever go back to normal after a war, and I'm certainly not claiming that I haven't changed after all that I've been through. I understand if you want to take a minute for yourself, but don't dwell on the bad memories, okay? You're fortunate enough to live in a community where everyone cares about you, and Cheerful Asriel needs to be there for them when the bad memories overcome them too."

Asriel nodded.

"How's this for a wish? We wish that nobody will ever feel the need to start a war again; that everyone, human, monster, or otherwise could realize that differences can be resolved to everyone's benefit; that people could realize how absurd it is to wish harm upon their brothers and sisters; that evil shouldn't have to be something we accept for granted; that even good people can make terrible mistakes; that sometimes bad things happen and all we can do is hope for the best; to reach out to others for help; to at least understand them before moving to assign blame. The galaxy can be vast and lonely, and it certainly doesn't need hatred to divide everybody even more."

(Hmph. Now that's a tall order, isn't it? Of course we'll do all that we can to keep the peace, but they'll have to learn to play nice by themselves sooner or later.)

The duo made their way to another river, where a small yellow bird was waiting for them. The bird began to tweet and flap its wings wildly, as if trying to get them to come closer. They obliged, and the bird somehow lifted them across the river.

"Asriel?"

"Yes?"

"This bird obviously exists outside of the laws of physics. What do you think would happen if I took it to the Ruins door?"

"You're still on that, aren't you?"

Bird in his paws, the alien wormholed to the Ruins door and set the bird down beside it, hoping for something to happen. As one would expect at this point, the door remained undisturbed. Luna returned, disappointed, with the bird a moment later. Eventually, they stumbled upon a piano and a locked door.

"Asriel...I'm starting to get a little twitchy here..."

"Wait, don't kick it yet! I know this one! If I play the right song, the door will open and there should be a legendary artifact inside!"

Asriel sat down in front of the piano and began to play a familiar tune. His companion froze in his tracks and shut his eyes for a moment.

"That's a nice little song. Kinda takes me back to happier days, even if they're long gone by now."

"Thanks. Chara actually taught me how to play it a while after we first met, and I've remembered it all this time because it always seemed to cheer her up."

With a shuddering and rumbling, the door slid open, revealing a small room with a red object on a pedestal. Luna picked it up and immediately dropped it with a sense of revulsion.

"Asriel?"

"Yes?"

"This is a slimy, old, red rubber ball. How is this an artifact in any way?"

"The legends say that an ancient warrior stumbled upon this one day and it led them to victory over an invading army. Well? Do you feel...victorious? Stronger? Like you could take on the world?"

"I feel like I need to go back to the river and rinse off my paws."

"Oh. I guess the stories were just stories, then."

"Was it significant to the humans in any way? Would it have caused a war if the humans thought the monsters stole it from them?"

"I don't think so...Frisk told me that human children and pets like to play with these, so it's not something worth fighting over...hey! You're writing all this down on your electric notepad phone thing!"

"Okay, okay, you caught me. No more working off the clock, I promise."

The two found a pile of ashes that smelled faintly of barbecued fish next to an unscathed mailbox. The ninth human had been here too, swath of destruction having graduated from 'teenager-level prank' to 'force of nature'.

"I wonder whose house this was?"

"NGAHHH!" screamed a voice behind them, "What did you two do to my house?"

* * *

Undyne 95 AT 64 DF

*Thinks you and Asriel burnt down her house.

*It doesn't exactly help your case that Asriel uses fire magic.

* * *

Both Luna's and Asriel's SOULs turned a shade of dark green. The alien grabbed the prince's arm and tried to pull him to a safe place, but he felt the ground tugging like glue at his feet every time he tried to take a step.

"Ha! Now you two can't escape!"

"And now I can't move my feet at all…and just when I decided blue was my least favorite color…sigh, this'll be fun."

Asriel turned around and let Undyne take a good look at him.

"Wait a minute, you're the prince. Okay, you can take a seat, but I'm gonna have to teach your friend a lesson here about trashing other monsters' houses."

Asriel's SOUL changed back into its original color. He thought about helping Luna, but figured instead that a fight with Undyne was an important part of the tour and sat down on a pile of wood and stones. Magical spears began to float toward the alien from four directions, which he sliced at and blocked with his characteristic sword.

* * *

Undyne HP: 250,000/250,000

*Captain of the Royal Guard.

* * *

"I didn't burn your house down. It was a ninth human who ran past here with a futuristic-looking space spear."

"You're gonna have to lie a little better than THAT. Not even Papyrus would believe you right now, and that's really saying something."

Another volley of ethereal spears approached at a faster clip, some of them swirling around the standing alien like leaves in a whirlwind.

"You aren't ever going to believe me, are you?"

"Nope!"

"But you like fighting for other's sake, don't you? I respect that. Let's have a little proposition then, fighter to fighter. If you win, then I admit I burnt down your house and I'll pay in full for the damages. But if I win, you let me go on to Hotland before this kid can cause too much more damage."

Undyne's eye lit up when Luna, cunning smile on display, mentioned something that sounded like a competition.

"You're on!"

Undyne, smacked by a miniature explosion, retaliated with an even larger and faster volley of spears, which the alien blocked the brunt of. Luna fired a dark energy blast twice from a vortex floating to the side of his head, narrowly missing Undyne with one and cleanly hitting her with the other.

* * *

Undyne HP: 233,426

*Perhaps a little too overeager to properly defend against your 'directed' array of attacks.

* * *

Undyne realized that it was suicidal to confine the caprine monster to projectile attacks and turned Luna's SOUL a snowy white again. This time, Luna sidestepped and dodged a volley of spears, tips quickly approaching the speed of bullets, and swung at Undyne directly with his sword. Undyne blocked with her own spear and pushed Luna away with the shaft, trying to capitalize her superior brawn against his speed and her longer-range spear against his blade. At the same time, the alien tried to lunge and close the distance, leading him to chase a backpedaling Undyne around the ashes of her house.

After five minutes of cat-and-mouse games, Luna got around the spear and knocked it aside with his sword. He figured the marine would give in now, but all of a sudden, Undyne grabbed his waist with both hands and lifted with all her strength.

Half a second later, the floor was where the ceiling should have been.

Another half-second later, the dazed alien looked up from the ground and saw hundreds of magical spears in a radius around him and a single larger spear pointing from an Undyne standing over him to his chin. There was absolutely no way for him to block all of the spears at once, and it seemed that Luna would owe the guard captain a brand-new house.

(Yikes, are those sharp…)

"Well, fluffybuns?" Undyne sneered. "What'cha gonna do now?"

"You were so close, Captain…and I don't mean the tips in my face either."

Luna, white SOUL still free to move around, snapped his fingers and vanished from the ground with a quick flash.

"Hey! Come back!"

"You know, that green SOUL thing actually caught me by surprise…it really cut off a lot of options for me."

The voice seemed to be coming from several different directions at once. Visibility was poor, and the charred house left plenty of hiding spots and ambush points. Undyne held her spear closer to herself, scanning desperately for the outline of a sneaking goat, and shouted, "Stop hiding! Come out and fight me!"

"Throwing away such an advantage, though…a fatal mistake!"

A flare struck Undyne's spear from above and her right, knocking the weapon tip-first into a wall.

"And with that, Undyne, " Luna announced from his perch, "I believe it's a draw. Good effort, though."

Characteristic screams, the sounds of someone who did not like not winning in the slightest, echoed throughout Waterfall.

"I'll be a good sport, all right? All I have right now is money that no one here wants to exchange for G's, but I'll still pay you back when I can."

With newfound respect for the otherworldly fighter, Undyne reached out to shake Luna's paw very _firmly_. There was a cracking sound, which could either have been the settling rubble or Luna's fingers.

"You'll have to go this way to get to Hotland, but I'm still holding you to your offer!"


	22. Discovery

Asriel and Luna kept walking, stopping before a red neon sign whose pixelated lights displayed "Welcome to Hotland" on a continuous moving loop. Although Luna had been to this part of the Underground, it was still awe-inspiring to see that a town and all of its industrial machinery could be suspended over what seemed like an endless ocean of magma. After a few more minutes of walking around, Asriel fell onto his paws and knees and started panting profusely.

"Why...does it...have to be...so hot here?"

The heat was starting to pester him too, but at least he had some cold Snowdin water in his gut to tide him over. Realizing that Asriel's insulated self hadn't had even the tiniest sip of anything since the beginning of the tour, Luna telekinetically grabbed a water cooler and offered his companion a drink. Asriel greedily obliged.

"I guess this thing will have to follow us around now."

The two wandered around the rocky precipices a bit more with a water cooler floating behind them, stopping every so often for a water break. Eventually, they reached a large, cubic building that looked like a laboratory. Peering in the door, Luna noticed that a yellow dinosaur-like monster in a lab coat was watching anime on a large computer screen.

"Oh? Visitors?"

The scientist looked eagerly at the door and noticed Asriel standing in the doorway with, as Chara phrased it, a "super soldier from the future."

"Hi, your majesty! Who's that with you? I don't think I've ever seen him around here before."

"This is Luna. He's a Boss Monster, but from a different world."

(I shouldn't even try to correct him at this point...)

"Different world? As in you're not from Earth? This is so exciting! Could you tell me a little more about yourself? I bet you get this all the time, but discovering extraterrestrial life is kind of a big deal here on Earth."

"Huh. Never would have guessed that. We're most well-known for building artificial planets and space stations across the Milky Way Galaxy. As impractical as that sounds when there are literally trillions of uninhabited planets for the taking, our philosophy is that other life deserves a chance to grow, explore other planets, and develop their unique technologies. This doesn't mean we won't intervene from time to time, which is where I come in. I am one of the leaders of the Morality Bureau, basically an intersection between Earth detectives and intelligence agents, and we go around the galaxy neutralizing, capturing, abducting, removing, subduing, terminating, dispatching, and/or thwarting anyone who threatens the interstellar peace."

Alphys's face lit up when Luna mentioned his career in fighting.

"Did you see a human with a silver energy spear pass through here, by the way? They were about this tall, and they were wearing a sweater…"

"Yeah, I saw someone in the windowsill. I think they were headed for the MTT Hotel. But, um…if it's not too much to ask…could we talk for a little while longer? There's still that 'confirmed existence of extraterrestrial life' thing. Do you guys use magic, too?"

"Of course."

Alphys wheeled out a dummy from a storeroom and asked Luna to do a test-fire. A moment later, a streamlined, purple bolt pierced the dummy's head, punched an expensive hole through the laboratory's wall, and then embedded itself into the rock formations outside with a dull thud.

"Sorry about that."

"Wow...this is incredible! It's just like that episode of Mew Mew Kissy Cutie 2 when they meet themselves from a parallel universe and..."

"You want to hook up a gazillion probes to my head until I start playing music like a radio antenna."

"I know, I know, this might be a lot to ask, but some kind of power is just pouring off of you and it looks a lot like the results Dr. Gaster got from his quantum physics experiments. Would you mind stepping into this box and letting me run some tests? This is all for science, of course, and I think we could learn a lot by analyzing a form of magic we've never seen before."

Luna agreed and stepped into a large glass box. The edges between the sides and the roof began to glow teal and scan him with a laser.

* * *

Luna 154 AT 70 DF HP: 275,000

*Hiding LV value as if his life depends on it.

*Lieutenant of the Morality Bureau.

*Proficient with a variety of melee weapons and magical attacks.

*Asriel is shorter. Toriel is slightly taller.

*White inverted SOUL.

* * *

A metal arm holding a syringe full of a red liquid silently poked Luna in the side.

"Hey! What was that?"

* * *

SOUL 18% DT 14% JS

*Power equivalent to a small fraction of a human SOUL.

*Determination seems to be empowering the SOUL without destabilizing the body. Multiple theories have posited this phenomenon and one monster has reported it in practice.

*Majority of SOUL is heavily concentrated and solidified dark energy, a subset of the magi-potential energy field so named because it is undetectable with conventional equipment. This subset has antigravitational properties.

*The body is somewhat less concentrated and partially matter. The SOUL appears to be drawing in and interacting with the dark energy field around it. Most of this is typical for a monster's SOUL and body.

*Magical attack pattern:

A. Flares of varying intensities launched from summoned black holes. May draw from the SOUL and/or launch the entire black hole itself, triggering a significantly stronger gamma ray burst. Modified black holes, wormholes, can be traveled through as "shortcuts" in space.

B. Telepathy by SOUL-SOUL tethering. Useful where words are not but unwanted intrusions can be detected and blocked.

C. Telekinesis by aforementioned antigravitational properties. Limited to single and sufficiently light targets.

D. Evades by "slow" wormholes and "fast" dodges, both of which rely on the same wormhole teleportation mechanism. "Fast" dodges are more exhausting. "Slow" wormholes are limited by a maximum range and can be blocked by another magic user.

* * *

An electrical coil emerged from the roof of the box and zapped Luna with a lightning bolt. Asriel complained about the burnt monster smell again.

"Ouch! What kind of tests are you running here? If this thing tries to probe me next, I might just start 'demonstrating' some attacks on the rest of your lab!"

* * *

*SOUL appears to lose part of its stored energy upon taking damage, indicating that Luna's HP, also like conventional monsters, is proportional to the amount of magical energy the SOUL contains. This suggests the following inferences:

*Absorbing more energy would restore HP, while releasing it or transferring it to another SOUL would drain HP. This is how healing magic is currently understood to work.

*Without the magical energy field, Luna's metabolism would drain energy from his own SOUL and therefore cost HP over time. In an empty void, this could lead to a slow, painful death.

*Overloading the SOUL with, for example, DT, may greatly increase energy flux at the cost of stamina.

* * *

"Actually, doc, there's something I've been meaning to ask you about that last result."

"Sure. What is it?"

"According to one of my colleagues, Gaster, well, tossed me into a liquid spill and then I turned into some purple death cloud version of myself. All my attacks came out hundreds of times stronger while I looked like that."

"Hmm...it sounds like a reaction some monsters exhibit in response to a burst of determination. I'm sure you know magic is attuned to your body, so if you have that ability, it wouldn't be surprising to see some physical changes with the increase in magical power. In your case, I guess the physical changes include 'purple death cloud' because of your preexisting affinity for dark energy attacks."

"Anything else you could tell me about this?"

"We could try it under clinical conditions, but I think this is the one time in science where you _don't_ want to replicate the results. Doing so would literally mean pouring disgusting goop on you until you drop dead from exhaustion."

"Yikes. Hadn't even thought about that. Looks like I shouldn't count on it when things get hairy."

"Umm...there's one last thing _I_ have to ask of you after seeing these results. You said earlier that you are, well, an alien, but the scanner's readouts are acting as if you were a Boss Monster, born and raised on Earth just like our king and queen. Would you mind if I took a DNA sample for analysis?"

The alien suddenly grew apprehensive and started to glance around the room nervously. If he let the scientist run her final test, the result could drastically alter the entire M.B.'s dynamic in relation to the monsters of Earth. There was also the matter of Luna's own identity at stake, his parents long gone and unable to clarify anything about to burst forth from the procedure. But Alphys's eyes were sparkling, and she was clearly enthusiastic about making a revolutionary scientific discovery.

Luna nodded slowly. Alphys put on a glove, plucked a single strand of fur from his head, and ran into one of the adjacent rooms. Before the alien could reconsider his acquiescence, a rectangular robot burst through a wall and announced, "Another new contestant? It's time for a quiz!"


	23. Rush

Mettaton 30 AT 999 DF

*You remind yourself to inform the good doctor that you will only be paying for _one_ of the two new holes in the wall.

*Asriel informs you that this is also part of the tour, so skipping this encounter is not an option.

* * *

"Oh yes! Welcome, darlings, to today's episode of 'Do or Die!' We've got a brand-new contestant today, so everyone give a big hand for the mysterious visitor himself, Loony!"

Luna looked confused but decided to give a theatrical bow, causing viewers all around the Underground to cheer wildly.

"Um…'Luna'."

"Eh, close enough. As always, there is only one simple rule. Answer the questions correctly, or _DIE!_ "

(Hmph. So, the talking calculator thinks he can kill me. We'll see about that.)

"Let's start with an easy one!"

* * *

What is the prize for answering correctly?

A) Cash.

B) More Boss fights.

C) New Car.

*D) Not dying.

* * *

"Correct! You're a natural at this!"

"Let's see if you've been paying attention!"

* * *

How many human SOULs are in the Underground right now?

A) 7.

B) 8.

*C) 9.

D) 10.

* * *

"Brilliant observations!"

"Here's another easy one!"

* * *

Mettaton has six apples and Alphys takes away four. Calculate the mass of the Sun.

*A) 1.989E30 kg.

B) 2.019E30 kg.

C) 1.889E30 kg.

D) 2.229E30 kg.

* * *

"Unbelievable! How did you figure it out?"

Asriel asked his companion how he could possibly know that, only to have him shrug mysteriously in response.

(The Sun loses mass over time as it fuses hydrogen, so if I made a black hole with its current mass, it would overpower the Sun's gravity and utterly destroy it. That's obviously ridiculous, but the measurement is still helpful for trajectories and orbits and the like.)

"This one's a little trickier!"

* * *

What is the answer to the next question?

A) B.

B) C.

C) D.

D) A.

*COMPLAIN

* * *

"What kind of a ridiculous question is that?"

"I'm sorry...but complaining is against the rules!"

*B) C

"That's right! You're on a lucky streak today!"

* * *

Two trains, A and B, both have a mass of 1 000 kg. Station A and Station B are on opposite sides of Earth. If train A leaves due north from Station A at 27.8 m/s at the same time B leaves due east from Station B at 33.4 m/s, how much does the gravitational center of the Earth change in one hour?

A) 5.6315 nm.

B) 7.3161 nm.

*C) 8.2264 nm.

D) 6.6377 nm.

* * *

"Brilliant! How did you possibly know that one?"

(But you just...I...the last question...never mind.)

"Try this essay question on for size!"

* * *

In a systematic manner that a power-hungry robot TV host can follow, please describe the process by which a starfighter is constructed.

Step 1: Obtain a...

* * *

The alien folded his arms and shook his head.

"I'm not answering that."

"But you must answer correctly to not die!"

"Nope. That is classified and I'm not handing over blueprints to just anyone."

"Are you refusing to answer, contestant?"

"Yes."

"Then _DIE!_ "

Mettaton raised a robotic finger and fired an unavoidable lightning bolt at Luna. With a quick sidestep, Luna dodged it anyway, feeling his fur stand on end as the electric charge passed by him harmlessly.

"Wha...how did you not die?"

Mettaton fired a few more lightning bolts, but Luna avoided all of them with ease.

"You aren't going to die, are you?"

"Nope."

Mettaton turned toward the camera and announced, "Well, with the visitor refusing to die, this show has no dramatic tension! Until next time, folks!"

With a few mechanical whirs, the robot's back transformed into a jet pack and flew straight through the roof of the lab, leaving bits of debris raining from the ceiling. Hearing the commotion, Alphys ran back into the room.

"Hey, doc...I'm not paying for that third hole either."

"Sorry about that 'murderous quiz bot' thing. Mettaton was a TV star I designed back when we were still trapped underground in order to help cheer everyone up. The only problem is that I programmed him to prioritize being a celebrity above all else. By the way, I have the results of the DNA analysis."

Luna held his breath and looked on anxiously as Alphys produced a long sheet of graph paper filled with charts, colored bars, and calculations.

"Your DNA is remarkably similar to the king and queen's, and the computer predicts that this is not likely due to random chance."

Asriel and Luna looked at each other, one of them checking the other for eye color, ear length, birthmarks; anything usually credited to genes, but many similarities were purely by virtue of Boss Monster anatomy.

"What? You're not going to tell me that I'm actually this kid's brother or something, are you?"

"No. The similarities aren't that intertwined. The patterns more closely resemble that of a herd of random gazelles than a family of them."

"So, what does this all mean?"

"There are two possibilities I can think of. Either Toriel, Asgore, and Boss Monsters in general are related to your bunch temporally, or you and all of your kind are in fact Boss Monsters. In any case, the relation is clearly there and the only question is whether Boss Monsters came from space or you guys came from Earth."

Luna clutched his head and stared deeply into the floor, trying to force the room to stop spinning. Alphys offered him a liquid tonic after noticing that his face had turned a shade or two greener, but the alien refused and gradually regained his composure.

He folded his arms, closed his eyes, sighed, and continued, "Our civilization predates Earth's by millions of years, so it's quite easy to conclude something about the royal family's ancestors. The real question is _which_ of us they're related to. I'll cross-check with our archives when I have the chance, but in the meantime, I want you to keep these results a secret. This theory is probably going to turn the relationship between the M.B. and the Monster Kingdom on its head. I can't afford to let even a word of incorrect information slip out."

Asriel's face lit up as if he had a burning question.

"And by the way, Asriel, this does _not_ mean you're an alien now. You, your parents, your grandparents, and several iterations of 'great-'s' have grown up on Earth and there is absolutely no reason to overthink this."

Asriel nodded. The alien couldn't tell if he was disappointed, relieved, or some odd mixture of the two.

"I understand. Anyway, I'm sure you two have somewhere to be, so if you just follow the puzzles, you'll get to the CORE in no time."

"More puzzles ahead? You couldn't...give me a hint or two, could you?"

Asriel mouthed "Don't do it" to Alphys because he was enjoying watching a decently powerful force of destruction fail at puzzles.

"Umm...sorry, I don't really have any hints!"

Luna sighed and walked out of the lab, preparing for another hour of puzzle-based torture. Soon, he and Asriel found themselves in front of a grid of pressurized steam vents superimposed on an archipelago. Each was labeled with one arrow pointing in one of the four cardinal directions.

"So, do I just step on these or..."

Luna lightly set his foot down on one of the vents, causing a jet of steam to blast him through the air onto a distant island with two more steam vents. Stepping on steam vent after steam vent, the alien hopped between dozens of islands but never got any closer to the end. After a hundred steam blasts or so, Luna finally found himself at the other side of the puzzle and called out to Asriel, "Hey! I found the right path!"

Asriel called for help, morphed into the God of Hyperdeath, floated nonchalantly past the vent puzzle, landed near Luna, and reverted into his normal self.

Luna smiled and remarked, "You little cheater!"

After a few more minutes of walking and sipping from their stolen water cooler, the duo found themselves in front of a metal-plated corridor. Scores of moving orange and blue lasers blocked their path, creating a twisted fence of light not unlike that of a high-tech security system. Luna did a few stretches and proceeded to crawl, jump, sidestep, and deftly weave his way to the end of the corridor without touching a single laser. Once at the end, Luna pulled a lever and deactivated the laser security grid.

"Yes, Asriel, I _have_ done stuff like this before. Wouldn't be much of an agent unless I could get around these kinds of things."

The two wandered around the corridor for a few more moments, but began to bump face-first into an ever-thickening wall of cobwebs. Eventually, the corridor emptied into a massive, rocky cavern littered with spiders and webs. The alien noticed several dozen silky hammocks hanging from the roof and walls, some empty, like unoccupied beds, and some stocked full of flour and vegetables like shelves and pantries. Dirty as it seemed, this place was somebody's home. In the middle of the cavern was a single wooden table with a plate of freshly baked muffins.

 _Spider Bake Sale: Muffins, only 41 G each! All proceeds go to real spiders!_

The alien thought about donating to the spiders' cause, but realized that he was one G short. Awkwardly placing a handful of strange-looking coins on the table to compensate for the difference, he took a muffin and walked toward the exit. Out of the shadows, a large spider wearing a bow tackled him to the ground and threw him up into a nearby web.

* * *

Muffet 48 AT 0 DF HP: 150,000

*Likes baking.

* * *

"Going so soon, dearie? But you haven't even paid for your purchase yet~"

"I'm one short, okay? It's a lot harder to come by your kingdom's currency when all of the random encounter monsters won't fight you, so I left you some of my people's money instead."

Luns summoned a dark energy sword and promptly cut himself down from the web, only to land and get stuck in another web. When he looked up, the spider was sizing up every inch of him, licking her lips and grinning all the while.

"I'm sorry, but I can't accept these chips as payment, no matter how shiny they may be. But maybe there's another way you can pay...with a dance, perhaps? Ahuhuhu!~"

"I'm guessing you were the one Chara had a food fight with…well, here goes."

 ***One Spider Dance Later...**

Asriel wondered if everyone was okay as the dust settled. Luna seemed to be uninjured, but the spider queen was splayed out on the floor of the cavern.

* * *

Luna HP: 267,000

*You didn't really expect flying donuts and croissants to hurt your friend very much, even if they were magical.

Muffet HP: 93,000

*Dark energy blasts, on the other hand...

* * *

Luna, still unsettled by the "Spider Dance," lent a healing orb to a dazed Muffet lying on the ground, left an IOU for double the purchase price, and exited the cavern as quickly as possible. Asriel caught up to him, and the two found themselves staring at a massive hotel overlooking all of Hotland.

"This is MTT Resort, the Underground's highest-class (and only) hotel. The MTT stands for Mettaton, who built this place as an entrance to the CORE and New Home, where I live. Also, it's air-conditioned, so we're going in _right now_."

Asriel grabbed Luna's arm and eagerly pulled him through the glass doors, where a refreshing blast of cold air greeted them. The lobby, painted a lustrous gold, featured a statue of Mettaton painstakingly carved out of rock from Waterfall. Luna looked around and realized that he and Asriel were alone in the lobby, with even the front desk missing its receptionist. Listening carefully, the two heard the faint sounds of cheers coming from behind a door labeled "Auditorium." Leaving the MTT lobby, they found themselves in a pitch-black room as the door slammed shut behind them.

A single spotlight came to life, following the duo with a circle of light as they felt their way around. Soon after, a second spotlight lit up a human-looking robot on the far side of the room.


	24. Showdown

Mettaton EX 47 AT 90 DF

*The Monster Kingdom's biggest star.

*They don't make talking calculators like they used to anymore. I'm not jealous. Stop smirking at me like that.

* * *

The robot host looked the maximum possible amount of surprised, both hands around his mouth in a dramatic pose.

"What are you doing here, backstage, before my biggest show of the year? Actually, wait, hold that thought. How would you like to join me onstage for the greatest performance the Underground has ever seen? The Number-One Star teaming up with the prince and a mysterious visitor...it'll be absolutely fabulous!"

 _*You inform Mettaton that you will take no part in his show after he tried to murder you with lightning three times in thirty seconds._

"You like money, right? I'll give you a 15% cut of the profits."

Luna still needed money to repair the wake of destruction left by the ninth human, and no one was going to exchange it for credits anytime soon.

"30%, and a little extra for Asriel's college fund. I don't know if he's thought about career choices yet, but I'm imagining...political science. History of monarchies. No, wait, psychology with three heaping scoops of counseling others. Astronomy?..."

"25% and you have to help me reach my highest ratings yet."

"Hmm...throw in Frisk's and Chara's tuition too."

"Deal."

One of the black walls behind the two retracted to reveal that Luna and Asriel were actually standing atop a stage with the TV sensation. Turning around slowly, they noticed that every seat in the auditorium had a monster on the edge of it. There must have been thousands of monsters in attendance, and all of them were cheering wildly.

"Are you alive, Hotland? We've got two special guests today!"

The M.B. commander waved with Asriel, causing the audience to go wild.

"Lights! Camera! Action!"

"Drama! Romance! Bloodshed!"

"Ready?"

Mettaton did a dance with his metallic legs before entering a martial-arts pose, daring Luna to approach. Luna pulled out a dark energy sword and did a little flourish with the sword in his paws before tossing it and Asriel up in the air. A second after, Asriel caught the sword in midair on the flat part of the blade with his mouth and landed perfectly. The audience oohed and aahed at the display.

(Is using telekinesis cheating? Nah...)

 ***Ratings: 3,500.**

"Time to heat things up a little!"

Mettaton's electric heart began to glow as he summoned a volley of bombs and hurled them at the duo, who evaded them with a mixture of cartwheels and rolls. Luna and Asriel, back-to-back, then turned toward the audience and gave them an intense, mysterious look.

 ***Ratings: 4,200.**

"Can you keep up?"

Miniature Mettatons flew in from behind the audience, bombarding the stage with heart-shaped projectiles. Luna intentionally dived into one of them and then vanished from the stage, causing the audience to jump out of their seats and squint to see where the alien could have gone. Crushing a black hole in his paw, Luna rose from one of seats to complete an impromptu magic trick. The audience clapped enthusiastically as Luna climbed back up onto the stage.

 ***Ratings: 7,000.**

"But how good are you on the dance floor?"

A disco ball descended from the ceiling, sending Luna and Mettaton into a quick duet. It ended when Mettaton suddenly flipped Luna onto the floor, who got up quickly. Asriel seemed well-accustomed to the craziness on the stage—it was just like playing pretend—but to Luna, it was definitely one of the stranger exercises he had gone through.

(Dark Flare!)

"Galacta Blazing!"

Luna and Asriel both extended arms and cast dilute, though visually spectacular magical attacks at Mettaton, making sure to send some explosions and stars directly over the audience's heads. The audience loudly expressed their approval of the duo's immersive style.

 ***Ratings: 8,500.**

"Time for an interview!"

"What's your favorite part of the Underground so far?"

Luna, a little unprepared, stared deeply into the audience and replied, "Mettaton, you're an...interesting character and all, but all of you are honestly something else. Years spent left for dead and none of you seem to hold even the slightest grudge against your visitors. Instead, you're warm, you're hospitable, and you certainly made this extraterrestrial feel welcome. You're all amazing, and don't let anybody tell you otherwise."

Some of the female monsters in the audience misinterpreted this and began wolf-whistling amidst everyone else's loud applause.

 ***Ratings: 11,000.**

"And everyone wants to know, how do you feel about humans?"

"Some of them are rather awful, unfortunately, but I like to think they're not all bad if you get to meet some of them. At least two of them care deeply about the happiness of others, while others have been through as much as you guys. Try to be nice to them, all right?"

A solemn atmosphere descended over the audience, but they clapped and nodded nonetheless.

"And if you don't, you'll be answering to me. Don't forget—we're ultimately here on behalf of the galaxy and it just so happens the humans have more to atone for right now."

Luna produced a sword and ran his claws over the point while staring and grinning viciously at the audience.

 ***Ratings: 10,200.**

"No!," Mettaton whispered, "Scaring them isn't good for ratings!"

Luna whispered back, "I have an idea!" and then walked, sharp smoking sword in his grasp, toward the edge of the stage and the relatively defenseless monsters.

The audience began to scream and panic, but Mettaton shouted, "Not to worry, I'll save you all!" and fired a lightning bolt at Luna who clutched his SOUL in feigned pain, staggered for a moment, and dramatically fell over.

"Mettaton! You're our hero!"

 ***Ratings: 15,000.**

"My goodness! Look at these ratings!"

Luna got up off the floor and joined Mettaton and Asriel for one last bow as the curtain descended, audience ecstatic after the most unusual show ever to rock the Underground.

 _*You won! You got 1,000,000 G and 0 EXP!_


	25. Judgment

Luna counted on his fingers for a few moments, mumbling to himself, "And after subtracting the damages that trigger-happy kid caused, that leaves me with a disappointing 243 G. Darn it."

After their performance, Luna and Asriel stumbled around in the CORE for a while before ending up in a yellow corridor. The faint flickering of lava shone through rows of mosaic glass windows fashioned in the style of the Delta Rune, illuminating marble pillars with red-orange light.

Asriel tugged on Luna's borrowed robe, whispering, "Something doesn't feel right here. This is the same hallway that I've walked through countless times, but it feels a lot colder and quieter than normal."

"heya, Azzy. this your friend?"

A short skeleton in a blue fur coat was standing at the opposite end of the corridor. The two goat monsters looked at each other, but neither of them knew when he arrived or how he entered without making a sound. He was just...there, watching them with the same look reserved for children caught stealing from a cookie jar.

"Yes," Asriel replied. Sans was acting normally, but there was still an unshakable sense of dread lingering in the corridor. He was smiling from ear to nonexistent ear, but his tone of voice didn't seem particularly joyful.

"You just wanted to stop by and see how the tour was going, right?" Asriel continued nervously.

"sure, kiddo. just gimme a sec."

Sans took a good look at Luna before jumping back in shock. Regaining his composure, the skeleton took a deep breath in and began a very familiar monologue. With the first few words, Asriel's stomach dropped like an elevator.

"it's a beautiful day outside."

"Sans! Wait! No!"

"birds are singing..."

"Don't fight him!"

"flowers are blooming..."

"Asriel, why does he want to fight me?"

"on days like these, 'kids' like you..."

"Kids." Plural. Reflexively, the alien telekinetically shoved Asriel away from the skeleton, but despite his speech, the prince wasn't Sans's focus. A Gaster Blaster appeared behind Luna and fired a white beam, knocking him to the floor.

"should be _burning in hell._ "

* * *

Sans 1 AT 1 DF HP: 1

*You tried to flee through a wormhole, but nothing happened when you snapped your fingers.

* * *

Whether this was true hell was a matter of debate, but something certainly smelled like it was on fire.

"Asriel! Run!"

But the prince didn't move an inch. He refused to believe that the skeleton who took him to Grillby's every week; who had an infinite collection of jokes to cheer him up with; who always looked at life with a light heart, could be serious about this. There must have been a misunderstanding somewhere, and he had to fix it. Even Sans seemed surprised by how adversely the laser affected the goat.

"huh. didn't think that would happen. if that stung, then how many SOULs must you have slain to go that high?"

"What are you talking about? I'm no mass murderer!"

"Stop doing this, Sans! He's saved me before and he's done so much to help the monsters! He's not evil!"

Sans responded with a volley of hundreds of bones. Luna defended himself as with Papyrus, but while the other guardsman's attacks delivered their payload of blunt force and bounced away, these bones were different. Each impact didn't only bump and bruise, but left itching, burning sensations crawling under his hide.

* * *

Luna 127 AT 56 DF HP: 244,009/275,000 (KR)

*Checking yourself, you feel as if every fibre of your being has been dunked in acid. Something about that beam weapon is harming you even after the blinding light has dissipated.

* * *

Luna hastily produced a badge.

"This must be some kind of misunderstanding. I'm a C.O. of the M.B., and we're dedicated to _saving_ lives, not ending them."

Sans summoned a wall of magical bones headed straight for Luna. He jumped out of the way, but Sans telekinetically grabbed him and threw him back into the wall's path. One crunching faceful of bones later, he found himself lying prone on the floor again.

"but you've killed plenty of times, haven't you? sure, intention has a little to do with the number, but that coldness in the back of your eye…"

* * *

 _I'll never forget the terrified looks on their faces when they turned around and saw me. I felt a surge of energy in my fingertips and a tingling shock arcing between my claws._

 _"I...I'll tear you all to shreds! Eat this!"_

 _I thought of a five-pointed star as hard as I could, just as my parents taught me to when I was learning how to use magic for the first time, but instead of a white star shooting out of my fingertips, there was a massive explosion and then a purple flash filled the alleyway. I knew for sure I didn't mess up, so why did it come out so strong?_

* * *

"But they were all criminals! Evil beings, some of them humans, who took pleasure in causing others suffering! You can't possibly judge me for killing someone who's murdered others! And some of them _murdered my parents_. Are you really going to punish me for _avenging their deaths_?"

Sans answered with five Gaster Blasters narrowly missing Luna.

"ehh, i won't pick on you for that one, but they weren't the only ones who died at your hands. well, space detective? wanna tell him how many or should i?"

* * *

 _My neck and paw burned from the supercharged magic attack I just performed, and it slowly dawned on me that whatever I just did, I had just vaporized two people. A lot of things were racing through my mind—fear, adrenaline, hatred, but I didn't mean to…_

* * *

"…stop it! He doesn't need to know!"

Luna cast a flare, but Sans easily warped away from the explosion.

"The rest were murderers, rapists, torturers, and the scum of civilization everywhere. Believe me, I tried to spare all of them, but they forced me into doing what I did, and frankly, anyone who's horrible enough to commit such atrocities _doesn't deserve to live_."

Sans telekinetically threw Luna through one of the mosaic windows before throwing him back into the hall through a second window. A horde of Gaster Blasters was waiting to fire another intense white beam down the corridor.

"and what gives you the right to decide whether they live or not? sure, criminals are criminals, but some of them still have families who never caused anyone 'pane'. what gives you the right to 'shatter' their families for the sake of dishing out some justice?"

Opponent outmatching him at range and overruling his telekinetic abilities, staying at a distance was clearly losing him ground. Luna swiped at Sans with a sword, hitting nothing but thin air with each strike.

"They made that choice for themselves!"

"how do you know that murder is the right way to react to a murder?"

"So, would you prefer if a gazillion assorted murderers, rapists, and thugs were still roaming the Earth right now? If they were willing to do what they did to fellow humans, what do you think they'll do to monsters?"

"a 'gazillion'? come on, you know you're painting with a fire hose there."

"Well, forgive me for a little pessimism given my circumstances!"

"they can't all be frisks and charas up there. that's something we can see eye-to-eye on. but, thinking the way you think…you and your herd are going to butt heads with the wrong humans sooner or later, and if that happens, monsters'll be getting the horns.

"i won't let you lead us into another war."

Sans flung Luna into a wall lined with bones, impaling him in several places and leaving red splatters on the wall he was pinned to. Eye glowing a brilliant shade of turquoise, the skeleton started taking deliberate, heavy steps toward the alien with a fleet of floating skulls following closely.

"lemme tell you about a timeline that almost came to exist, 'kid goat'. in this timeline, frisk is a genocidal maniac and slaughters every single monster in the Underground. this includes _you_ , prince goat kid, and _your sister too_."

Even Asriel, cringing behind a pillar, started to wonder about the things his guest was shouting. Remembering back, Luna always seemed willing to talk about even his darkest days, but he also remembered Sans hardly ever being wrong. Come to think of it, it wouldn't have been impossible for Luna to block certain details from his relatively inexperienced magical scanning. The latest earful, the thought of that gentle human who saved him playing the role of a mass murderer instead, froze him in horror.

"but that hasn't come anywhere near happening. know what did happen? you space goats show up, and then a whole army of humans chases your tails straight into our living rooms. if frisk hadn't channeled her inner acrobat when she did, they could have shot asriel…and something about your face right now tells me what you would've done if he hadn't dodged a bullet."

The itching and burning had spread to places he couldn't scratch, driving him insane from the inside out. Unlike the other attacks, the alien couldn't simply shrug off the damage from this one. The bones were magical, technically, but they were as sharp and solid as metal blades. It took all of his willpower just to free himself from the calcified nails without blacking out from the pain, and the blood-soaked floor started to look much more comfortable than staying standing. Luna broke free of the bones, only to be thrown into the ceiling shortly after. But Sans was right. No sane commander would have led the royal family out onto a bridge exposed to sniper fire from every direction but the magma ocean below. Even more disturbingly, Luna realized that no matter his thought process or justifications at the time, he had effectively tried to sacrifice the Dreemurrs' well-being for the sake of provoking war.

"well? are you a goat or a hawk?"

With that one icy sentence, Luna dropped the sword from his paw and froze where he stood. The possibility was never as remote as he had hoped. Their battleships existed for a reason. In the desire for interstellar peace, full-scale wars against civilizations deemed nonredeemable were declared every few millennia. Inevitably, some of these led to genocides, black marks collected over the years as they punished the hateful; the oppressive; those absolutely incapable of coexisting with their neighbors unless they were stripping them of rights, enslaving them, or outright perpetuating their own genocides against them. It seemed unthinkable to the alien that he would have fabricated such a terrible contingency, but if Sans was telling the truth; that such a timeline was possible, then there truly was a part of him prepared to live up to his name.

* * *

Luna 90 AT 0 DF HP: 152,000 (KR)

*smells like a breakdown.

* * *

A single massive Gaster Blaster appeared behind Sans and filled the corridor with a single solid beam. There was a cracking noise coming from Luna's direction. The alien, on one knee and breathing heavily, began to address Sans in a desperate, nearly pleading voice.

"He's right, okay? There. Are you happy now? Hear that, Your Highness?"

"that's what i thought—"

Kneeling, trembling, and cradling a pulsing white heart like a baby bird, the alien kept whispering, "I'm sorry…I'm so sorry…," one-third to himself, one-third to the little light he was staring into, and one-third to anyone listening.

There was a whoosh from the end of the corridor. A single, glowing bone punctured through the SOUL and stopped a finger's width from Luna's head. His gaze unfocused. A single red drop dripped out of his mouth and splashed onto the tiled floor.

"welp…guess that's it."

A horned, toothy, jagged wolf's skull crystallized out of thin air, white light intensifying in its jaw cavity as its caster aimed for one last attack.

"No! Stop!"

One small, teary goat monster willed himself away from the pillar and latched onto a puffy, blue sleeve. Focus interrupted, the skull shut its mouth and turned around like a confused dog before vanishing completely.

"what the…aww, kid…don't be like that…you win, okay? no more fighting. see? poof. gone."

Asriel buried himself in Sans' jacket, letting out an occasional muffled sniffle, while Sans reached around to gently stroke behind his ears and quietly comfort him. He snuck a glance over his head; all there was left was a pool of liquid quickly evaporating into a pile of fine, white powder. The prince _definitely_ didn't need to see that, but with the subtly nervous expression forming on Sans's face, he couldn't stop him from turning around quickly enough.

"…Sans! Did you really…"

"this is real baa-d, kiddo…you need to 'hoof' it out of here as fast as you can. you weren't involved, you won't get in trouble. anything they chuck my way, i'll handle myself."

"We'll go to my Mom and Dad; they always know what to do. They'll fix it, Sans; they always do!"


	26. Finality

Still trying to get as far away from Sans as possible, Luna tumbled out of the corridor and toward a grey brick house. He looked over his shoulder a few times along the way, feeling more and more relieved each time he noticed a distinct lack of demonic laser cannons behind him; half-paying attention to anything in front of him, he bumped straight into Toriel and Asgore and fell hind-end-first onto the floor.

"Good heavens! Are you all right? Wasn't Asriel just giving you a tour?"

* * *

Luna HP: 27,000/275,000 (KR)

*Good heavens indeed.

* * *

"Yeah…we…I got…into some trouble…"

Asriel's parents blanketed the goat monster with all sorts of healing magic and then helped him to his feet. Family or otherwise, they knew exactly how to comfort somebody: where he needed a warm touch, what reassuring words to say; even the perfect amount of time to stay silent so the alien's thoughts could catch up to him. But when he tried to take a step forward, they were on him like birds on their eggs.

"No, no, don't move, you need to rest. Gorey, you grab his legs and we'll set you down in a bed, okay?"

"I, um...I think I'm fine. Really."

"Well, if you insist, but at least sit down before you fall over."

Toriel brought a wooden chair from the living room and set it down near the doorway. Next came a soft blanket draped over the young monster's achy shoulders. Asriel, tugging along a fatigued Sans, entered shortly after. His eyes grew wide as a single finger rose to point toward the seated monster.

"You're alive! You…you jerk! We thought you died! How could you make us worry like that?"

The prince approached as if to punch the sitting alien, but Luna had already started toward Sans with a sword drawn.

"Bone Head…I had the decency to spare the prince the trauma of dying in front of him, but if you insist upon continuing this in their _own home_ …"

Luna swung, missed, and started chasing after Sans, but Toriel grabbed his ear and pulled him away. Asgore was in front of Sans, blocking him in a similar manner.

"Stop right this instant. Both of you!"

"Are we to understand that you two fought each other? To the death? _In front of our son_?"

"He started it…"

"he attracts trouble like a magnet, toriel. i was worried asriel was in trouble."

"And what am I hearing about you turning to dust in front of Asriel?"

"It's flour. Just harmless flour borrowed from a certain bakery owner. I needed a way—any way—to escape. But he was blocking my teleport. I had to make it more realistic to buy enough time to get away on foot."

"hey, it's not my fault karmic retribution took effect on you. it activates on anyone with high enough LV."

"That…was…awful! Your karma-whatever hurt and still hurts!"

(Oh, and that _wasn't_ flour either…)

"That's enough. Both of you, as peacekeepers and as monsters, should know better than to conduct yourself this way."

Feeling the judging eyes of both Dreemurr parents, the goat monster and the skeleton extended their arms for an unenthusiastic handshake and half-hearted apologies. There was a flash, and Sans was gone. An awkward silence filled New Home in his place.

"I…owe you all an apology. I really do. You're correct; the M.B. expects the highest standards from its members. I think it would be best if I…stayed away from him in the future."

Another heap of awkward silence barged through the door and parked itself on top of the first.

Trying to change the subject, Asriel announced, "So, this is New Home! It's where I live with Mom, Dad, Frisk, and Chara. Over there is the kitchen, where I can smell a fresh butterscotch-cinnamon pie baking in the oven, and Frisk is drawing something on the table. To the right is our bedrooms: one for my parents and one for the three of us. Chara went out behind the house, and if you head there, the path will lead you to where the barrier once stood and then to the surface again."

"You're also welcome to visit here if you want. Your line of work clearly gets exhausting, and it's nice to rest every now and then."

"A break sounds too good to be true right now...unless that's because it _is._ There's an obligatory fight or puzzle here, isn't there?"

"There are no puzzles here, but you'll have to fight Dad."

"Um, no. Bad idea. Thank you, Asriel, you've been a great tour guide."

(Although I don't exactly agree with the concept of forcing everyone who falls down into a series of mandatory puzzles and fights…)

"I never got a chance to ask you three this, but how are _you_ all feeling? Is everything okay here?"

"Everything's been wonderful so far. All of the monsters are grateful that they can return to the surface, but it still feels uncomfortable to step outside of this place. After all, they killed so many of us right outside our own doors and it's still a little difficult to trust the humans this time. They were nice enough when we were gathered around the signing table, but could it truly all be over? The war never really leaves the back of our minds, and Asriel still drags Frisk and Chara out every night to see the stars because he's worried that something bad will happen and he'll never see them again."

"Is that why Sans attacked me so readily?"

A difficult silence.

"Part of it is the distrust. We and the humans have been generally keeping our distance from each other, so we haven't had a lot of visitors lately. Something about you must have made him jump out of his skin."

"But he's really a nice guy once you get to know him! He takes us to Grillby's all the time and he's always been a lot of fun."

"Nevertheless, a life of constant worrying isn't really a life at all. Don't be afraid of them, okay? There are a lot of Frisks and Charas out there, and my colleagues will always be around to deal with the more unpleasant ones. Oh…I've been talking about 'colleagues' a lot, haven't I, and I haven't been providing much explanation either. Do any of you have any questions for me?"

There was a bit of dried something on one of his horns. Curious objects, they were neither 'Toriel modest' nor 'Asgore gargantuan'.

"How does life on your home planet work? Are there, um..."

Nothing he hadn't been asked before. A seemingly straightforward question answered in simple terms, but some askers found it difficult to articulate the last few words.

"Two sexes? Yes, I suppose it works a lot like it does on Earth. The males tend to be a little bigger...and then there's the difference in vocal pitch...and the, um...'plumbing' in the 'basement,' but nothing I'm saying seems to be surprising you very much, so that's nice."

"Have you seen other worlds with life out there? What do they look like compared to Earth?"

Some agents once reported being asked this dozens of times in an hour. No matter which planet the caprines visited, every civilization which hadn't already made the discovery always had a burning desire to know if it was truly part of a larger living ecosystem.

"Yes. There's quite a lot of variation out there, and although I haven't spent a lot of time outside of this solar system, I know that over the years, a couple of my teammates have seen everything from little green men to flying pink clouds. Usually it's better for us to commit to one or a few star systems, so they can get acquainted with the local cultures and customs."

Maybe he could stand to improve in that department. After all, knife fights were hardly customary for first meetings between humans.

"You didn't strike me as a grey-haired, grizzled sailor, to be honest. How old are you?"

This one was a small shock. The alien scratched his head and shifted his scarf uncomfortably before doing some arithmetic on his fingers.

"In Earth years...seventeen, give or take a year. I still remember the day they let me into the M.B.; I was a little younger than Asriel is now and for the first few weeks, they had the most disbelieving looks stuck on their faces. Heh, I sure showed them..."

"But you were so young then! And they let you fight dangerous criminals with such deadly weapons?"

"Well, it sure didn't matter back at Switzerland, did it?" Luna responded with all the indignation of a teenager. "I kind of had to grow up a lot faster than I should have because of that whole 'orphan' thing."

"Orphan? What happened to your parents?"

Luna's face darkened for a moment, but he didn't want to depress the royal family with him. Conceding that they deserved to know, he retrieved a dated newspaper article from his phone and invited the others to huddle around.

 _"Local Precinct Battles Night Demons; Two Dead Found Morning After"_

"They had Gaster cornered in an alleyway, but then some uniforms followed them in and shot them right in front of me. I knew that this M.B. business is an incredibly dangerous career, but I never really thought that could ever happen to them; they just seemed so...righteous and invincible and I always thought the good guys were supposed to win in the end, much less be killed by other 'good guys.' It was justice for them that spurred me into this job so early, and I'm sure they're proud of how we dealt with the scientist. Even though I'm young, I like to think I've proven myself capable of this job time and time again. Your son has absolutely nothing to worry about with me around."

"It is not him we're worried about. He's a Dreemurr, and Dreemurrs are no pushovers."

"It is you, commander. We aren't questioning your tactical prowess, but you have gone through quite a lot for someone that young. How are you feeling?"

She had a way with opening up even the stoniest and thorniest of hearts. The alien sighed heavily, leaned on the chair's back, and picked at his neatly trimmed claws, mumbling, "Sometimes I feel as if I'm the one that fate forgot about. Those officers defeated my parents, so I'm sure they could have killed me too that day. Any hesitation to fight back fell silent immediately; not only did I not let those humans hurt me (physically, anyway), I _destroyed_ them. Now you three know too, but…the rest of the story…what Sans and I were actually fighting over…I don't know if I'm ready to hear it myself."

They weren't exactly about to tie him down and force it out of him.

"Maybe I do have things to think about. Or, maybe my head's a neurotic mess. A criminal stole my family for no good reason, after all. I know this Gaster isn't the same person as that horrible demon, but my chance to have a normal life died that night. I'd fling myself into a black hole before I let that happen to Asriel."

Although they had plenty of time to get accustomed to professional, business-like Luna, it was strange to talk to him in a casual environment after discovering that the professional was no older than a teenager. Nevertheless, the Dreemurrs smiled a little, and even though a cold night had fallen outside, the world seemed just a bit warmer.

"Oh! The pie is ready! Let's go get Chara so we can all enjoy it together."

Everyone headed out of the house and walked toward the barrier room.


	27. Chara

The Dreemurrs and Luna sprinted into the barrier room, only to see Chara standing opposite the ninth human. Against the sound of a porcelain plate and slice of pie shattering against the ground, Chara had drawn a knife while the other was aiming the light spear straight at her. Wisps of gas streamed from the end, proving that it had been fired recently.

Luna covered his gaping mouth and thought to himself, "Oh no, I forgot about the ninth human! I was supposed to be keeping track of them and oh my...what have they gotten themselves into now?"

"Chara! Who is that?"

"Are you all right? Did they hurt you?"

Toriel extended a paw toward her daughter, but Chara looked frozen in shock.

The ninth human ignored the group and said, "Greetings, Chara. It's been a while. Do you still recognize me?"

"It's me, your dear brother."

* * *

Anta 95 AT 15 DF

*You have a bad feeling about this.

* * *

She made sure to smile no matter how dark it got underground. She even put on a brave face while her home was being set ablaze and her friends were being captured by rampaging humans. But for the first time ever, Chara looked as if she was genuinely worried.

"Why are you here? How did you find me?"

"I must admit, dear sister, it was very difficult. I looked all over the village, and when that didn't work, I called the local police stations to see if they had found a missing child. I started to give up when we moved out of the village, and for a while, I tried to forget you. Maybe those monsters everyone talks about got to you, or maybe the earthquake did, but each day when I didn't know if you were still alive tore at my heart. Imagine my surprise when one day, I turned on the news and saw your face at Switzerland, helping those monsters in the doorway over there negotiate a peace treaty. I knew then that you were still here."

Anta grinned from ear to ear, but something about his smile was off-putting and much less than cheerful.

"Ngh..."

"But now I've found you, Chara. I'm so happy to see you again. We can finally be together. Please come home with me; Mom and Dad will be so glad to see that you're safe."

The human extended a hand and beckoned for his sister to come to his side. Instead, Chara gripped the knife more tightly and backed away.

"No! I'm not going back! Not to them!"

The words hit Toriel like bricks, who now looked confused and increasingly anxious.

"Chara? But you told us so long ago that you were an orphan. If your parents are alive and well, then they must be worried sick about you. You've been such a good child and it deeply hurts me to say this, but we can't keep you here if somewhere out there, your mom and dad are looking for you."

"This is priceless, dear sister. Telling them that you had no family so they would take you in? Well, _goat lady_ , I can assure you that Chara's family is _very much alive_."

"That doesn't matter. I've made up my mind a long time ago that they're _dead to me_."

Chara shifted her right sleeve unconsciously. In that brief moment, Luna noticed scars and black, burn-like marks on her arm that seemed improperly healed, the first clues as to why Chara was acting this way. He whispered telepathically to Toriel, "You know what this is about, right?"

Toriel nodded gravely.

* * *

 _"Chara, dear, are you finished getting dressed yet? I need to retrieve my phone from the desk and—"_

 _"Wait, Mom, I'm almost—"_

 _"Your arm! What happened? Does it hurt?"_

 _"It's nothing, okay? I, um…got it when I fell down here!"_

 _"My child, that was months ago! Please, tell me what happened. Did someone hurt you?"_

 _"I don't wanna talk about it!"_

 _"Chara? Mommy?"_

 _"Azzy?"_

 _"What's that on your—"_

 _"It's nothing a crybaby needs to know about!"_

* * *

"Don't say that, Chara! They still love you! They just want their daughter back and, well, I want my best friend back."

Chara shifted her gaze to the side, looking uncertain. Anta looked like he was two seconds away from a meltdown.

"Chara? Are you listening to me?"

Chara clutched the heart locket.

"Please! I don't want to lose you again!"

"I'm sorry, brother, but I'm not going back. This is my family now."

"Fine then. If I can't get you to come with me, then I'll have to _drag you home_."

Anta raised the spear and fired a three-round burst, narrowly missing Chara.

* * *

Anta HP: 60/60

*LV 10.

*You can't go back.

* * *

Chara swiped at her brother, dealing a glancing blow and dodging another volley of burning light.

"Stop it, Anta, I don't want to fight you."

"If this is the only way to get you back, then I don't want to _stop_ fighting you!"

The two continued to exchange knife swings and magic blasts. Anta wasn't quite fast enough to completely evade Chara's knife, but the hot, red globs were landing closer and closer to Chara. She was physically tired, psychologically aching, and struggling to avoid attacks flying at several times the speed of bullets.

Anta looked at the long weapon in his hands and smiled, shouting, "Don't you see who has the upper hand here? Give up already!"

"Never!"

Chara lunged at Anta again, this time slashing him across the face. A few drops of red blood flew across the room and splattered mere inches from the group. Asriel and Frisk looked sick to their stomachs, leading Toriel to try and walk them back into New Home. However, they stood firm and refused to abandon their sister in her darkest hour.

* * *

Anta HP: 48/60

*You can't go back.

*But you can't kill your brother, either.

* * *

Afraid at what she had just done, Chara put down the bloodstained knife and grabbed her right arm. She wasn't the one with the gash across her face, and yet, everything everywhere hurt—from the desperate tears in her eyes to her trembling hands to her aching feet.

"No! I'm not going to fight you anymore, but I'm not going back to Mom and Dad either!"

Anta snapped, shouting, "You idiot! How is it possible that a child doesn't want to run back to their mommy and daddy again? Don't you miss them, Chara? We could be a family again, and here you are, just throwing the chance away like it _never meant anything to you_!"

Anta raised the lance again, but Chara wasn't reacting. There was a click; a crimson bolt landed against her stomach and disintegrated into a wave of hot gas.

* * *

Chara HP: 30/44

*Alive. Make sure she doesn't take another one.

* * *

The child lay on her back, writhing and clutching her stomach. Out of the corner of her eye, Chara noticed that Frisk's knife was glowing a faint shade of red. Determination was protecting her from the worst of the blast and future attacks, but Anta had pushed the spear to its breaking point. Indignantly, he threw the now-useless weapon onto the ground. Chara, being tended to by her adoptive mother but still in no state to get up off the ground, summoned the last of her strength and rolled up her sleeve.

Asriel looked about ready to throw up.

"Is...is this what you want me to go back to, Anta? If you really...cared about me, you'd keep me as far away from them as you could!"

"But they've changed! They promised me they wouldn't hit you anymore, and they told me they've give anything to be with you again."

"And you believe them? Look at _your_ arm!"

During the struggle, Chara had torn Anta's sleeve. No longer preoccupied with fighting, everyone noticed that Anta bore similar, but slightly faded black marks on his arm as well.

"But..."

"Those sickos you still call Mom and Dad _did this to both of us_ , and now...now you're telling me that they've changed? Think back, brother. Did they tell you they would change after they hurt you? Did they promise to change after I was born?

Anta stood speechless, which, in a way, admitted that Chara was right.

"As much as it hurts me and you to say this, those two aren't our parents and they don't deserve to be. Anta, I have a...family here, one that actually loves me and cares about me. You said you didn't want to lose me again, but now you've...found me. You could stay with us, and we...we could be a _real_ family again."

Asgore extended a paw, saying, "Human, my wife and I would be happy to take care of you."

"No! Get away from me!"

"But we could feed you, and give you a nice place to live, and you could be happy here. Didn't you say you wanted to be with your sister again?"

"Stay away!"

Luna, having some experience with hostage negotiations, tried a different angle of appeal. After all, who better to reason with a fourteen-year-old than another teenager?

"If you stay with us, we can protect you. You're safe from your parents here, but I can't guarantee the same if you go back. You're a smart kid, and I know you'll make the right choice here."

Anta, physically and mentally exhausted, broke down into tears and ran out of the room and into the moonlight, muttering a combination of "No," "I can't," "Mom," "Dad," and "Chara" between sobs.

Luna suddenly felt a strong sense of dread; not because his tongue failed him, but because nothing could be more dangerous than an emotional breakdown. There were only so many possibilities cool, logical thinking could achieve; with fear and anger came unpredictability; with unpredictability, accidents and tragedies.

"Quick! What comes after the Asgore fight?"

"The barrier, and after that, there's a cave that leads outside."

"I think I know where the kid is going. We need to get to where I put my starfighter _now._ "

* * *

Starfighter AT=1150 DF=775

 _*First a space lance, and now a spaceship?_

 _*You hop into the cockpit._

*Luna, you're too late. For their safety, I'll tell the ninth human how this thing works.

*Running diagnostics…

*Standard fighter-attack craft used against space targets, but performs fairly well against ground, aerial, and waterborne targets.

*Cloaking abilities allow starfighters to resist a variety of countermeasures and mount surprise attacks. Cloaked starfighters keep track of one another's position by tracking the pilot's SOUL as it moves through space.

*Length: 20 m.

*Wingspan: 13 m.

*Maximum speed in these conditions: 1 400 m/s. Disabling all but rear thrusters…

*Minimum speed: 5 m/s. with limited vertical takeoff and landing capabilities. By the way, I can't help the child land this thing.

*Power source: Hydrogen Fusion Reactor providing 80 hours of flight time at full capacity. Modified to conceal heat signature.

*Wormhole generator installed, allowing teleportation at a maximum range of roughly one solar system.

*Coffee machine and filing cabinet installed. I don't know why I keep covering for him if he's going to keep sneaking these things into every spacecraft he touches...

*Weapons are based on launching the same hydrogen plasma that powers the engine—but from a different compartment, of course.

* * *

The Dreemurrs and Luna bolted out of the Underground, only to see a starfighter take off without them. Helplessly, they watched as the faint blue flames poking out of its tail end shrank and faded into the darkness.

"Forget the spear, now he's found a full-blown war machine! We have to go after him!"

"The A.I. has probably turned on the autopilot, so all he'll do is cruise to and orbit whatever destination he selected until the Fusion Reactor runs out of juice and then...wait. We all saw him take off, right? With our own eyes?"

"Yes! Why would you even ask such a question at a time like this?"

"It's as I thought. The thing practically flies itself, but Anta didn't activate the stealth field when he took off. Radar stations will spot him easily, and when they report him as an unidentified fighter craft…this is bad. Really, really, bad."

Luna called for help. A wormhole appeared in the night sky and spat out a larger spaceship, which landed gently beside the group. Out stepped six agents in assorted light armor, who greeted Luna and waved to the royal family. Just as the alien leader began to explain the dire situation, one of the agents whispered something to another, and both of them snickered under their paws.

"What's so funny?"

"Nothing, sir, just…that's a lovely dress you have on!"

"Dress? What…oh, for goodness sakes, we have a major problem here! A decloaked starfighter's been stolen!"

"Then that means…our cover's been compromised. If the humans connect the starfighter to the monsters, everything could come apart in an instant. Who's our subject today, sir? A violent criminal? A whole gang of them? A corrupt local government?"

"Um...yes, two violent criminals, I suppose, and that isn't even the whole story. Some of you may recognize the monsters and humans standing beside me, because the M.B. has intervened on behalf of that monster child, Asriel, and that human child with the knife, Chara, before. It turns out that Chara had fled her biological parents in order to live with that family of monsters. Normally, we would help reunite the parents with their child..."

(Just because some of them are bad doesn't mean we should ignore their cries for help…)

"...but Chara has made the choice to recognize the monsters' king and queen as her parents instead."

Chara lifted her sleeve and all of the agents groaned in disgust. Although they had trained to handle their fair share of atrocities, the agents were never quite ready for crimes of this nature.

"What even are _those_?"

"They're black like the night! Are those fourth-degree burns?"

"That kid must be neutronium through and through if she survived one of those!"

"Settle down. We don't know what they are either, but we have more important things to worry about now. Moments earlier, Chara's brother, Anta, found his way here to convince Chara to return with him to her biological family. Not surprisingly, he failed spectacularly, and now he's taken a starfighter and is headed back to his parents. That about sums up the situation, so does anyone have any questions?"

An agent raised a paw, asking, "What are this assignment's rules of engagement?"

The Dreemurrs grew pale as about half of the agents walked back into the carrier ship and rummaged around for their favorite lances. The other half checked the state of their magic—Asriel saw a fireball much like his own, but also spheres of lightning and flaming, meteor-like rocky projectiles. Their long-eared allies were speaking in the same jargon the Royal Guard's predecessors used during the first Human-Monster War.

"First and foremost, we must ensure than no harm comes to Chara's brother. He obviously does not know how to land his newfound vehicle, so we need to guide him down to solid ground before something forces him there."

"Second, Anta will likely alert his parents after landing, and his parents will likely alert the authorities. They will likely charge Chara's adoptive parents with kidnapping and initiate a global manhunt unless everyone involved here is present to defuse the situation. Yes…go for the light spears. Ideally, we'll wrap this up without violence, but if need be we can still pass them off as the monsters' prototypes. We've pushed too far to have the Earth be lost in another war."

"Third, there is _clear and convincing evidence_ that Chara's biological parents did _something_ to both of their children, and we must make sure that justice is served. As a reminder to all of you, our codes of law consider that a particularly cruel form of torture _._ Does anyone else have any more questions?"

"Will shoot-on-sight protocol be followed?"

The sound of this question and its implications turned the Dreemurrs an even whiter shade of white, made even worse when Luna didn't answer immediately. Somewhere in the back of the alien commander's mind was a part of him who wanted nothing more than to tear the parents into bloody pieces, so that Chara couldn't possibly be forced to live with them again. Luna looked at the agents and the Dreemurrs anxiously, realizing that his answer now would set the tone for relations between monsters and humans for years to come.

"No, but standard self-defense applies. Unfortunately, the legal matters of this situation still fall within the humans' jurisdiction. On paper, Chara's biological parents are still technically their legal guardians, but don't think for a second that we're leaving Chara with them. Any more questions?"

"But I don't want to live with them! Can't you do anything to make it so I can stay here?"

"If we can somehow strip your parents of their 'legal guardian' status, then the human authorities will be powerless to interfere further in this matter and then our Ministry of Justice will take over. Any last questions?"

"Yeah," replied an agent, "What are we waiting for? Let's go!"

"Now that's the attitude I like to hear. We'll make the approach cloaked and try to reveal ourselves without scaring him. Chara, you're coming with me to the bridge. Maybe you can talk your brother out of whatever he's planning."

Everyone quickly boarded the waiting starfighters and took off in Anta's direction. Flying over the shadows of lakes, forests, and human cities, they eventually spotted the faint light of a starfighter circling a suburban neighborhood. Luna flicked a few switches and opened communications between his spaceship and Anta's.

"Anta! You're making a big mistake here! There is nowhere you can run that they can't get to; just pull the spaceship over and we can talk about this. Please! I don't want you to get hurt!"

"Stop following me around! I'll shoot if you come any closer!"

"So much for talking him out..."

Anta clumsily jerked the starfighter toward the carrier and pressed two red buttons on the tip of the steering controls. The starfighter emitted a charging hum and raked the hull with glowing bolts, plasma disintegrating as it met the larger vessel's shield. Craft only barely scratched by the attack, the pilot took over communications from Chara.

"Hmph. Takes a lot of guts to pit your novice self against me; luckily, that dogfight won't be happening tonight. You also physically can't land this thing by yourself, and it's going to run out of power soon. We can decide what happens later when you're firmly on the ground again, but unless you wish to become much better acquainted with the ground than you ever thought possible, I need you to listen carefully."

"Why should I listen to you?"

"Because you've been marked as a hostile quantum signature and we still haven't blasted you out of the sky yet! Do you think we've followed you this far just to invite you to our tea party? Now listen up; you're going to land a plane today!"

"Okay! Fine! Now help me!"

"Pull back on the throttle as far as it will go and hold it there until the number above the 'speed' icon won't go any lower. Don't worry about falling out of the sky; the engines will automatically adjust their outflow and it'll be like flying a helicopter."

"But I don't know how to fly a helicopter!"

"It can't be harder than flying a fighter craft. Just do it and stay calm."

"Wait, which one of these says 'speed'? All the words are written in gibberish!"

"Someone find me a manual…okay, do you see the nine rectangular meters directly in front of you?"

"Yes!"

"It's the middle top one."

Anta's starfighter slowed to a crawl and began to lazily drift above the neighborhood.

"Now what?"

"Good. Now, the on-board computer will eventually turn the starfighter so that it is lined up with a street on the ground. Just look for rows of streetlights. When that happens, move the lever labeled 'Landing Gear'—it's the one with a light blue tip—to the 'On' position. You'll hear a click, and you'll notice that the throttle can be pulled back even further. When that happens, gently pull back on the throttle."

Anta's starfighter gingerly approached the asphalt, skipped and bounced a few times, and skidded into a tree planted in someone's front yard. It wasn't an ideal landing, but Chara's brother had handled the fighter well enough to avoid the worst of the crash. The carrier slowed to a midair crawl, deposited its passengers beside the wreck by wormhole, retrieved the wreck into its cargo bay, and retreated upward before fading into the night sky again. There were footprints leading from the smoking pile of spacecraft residue into a nearby house.

"Is this your house, Chara?"

Chara nodded yes. The house was a nondescript Dutch Colonial; one of many similar buildings planted up and down the street, but something about it was rather unsettling. Maybe it was the way the lights from the windows made the monsters' shadows dance from the tree branches, but Luna blamed it on an off-putting smell he couldn't quite identify drifting out from the open windows. Not a moment later, the porch light flickered on and Anta and two adult humans burst from the front door.

"They're the kidnappers! Call the police!"

Chara's mother dashed back into the house in search of a phone while Chara's father drew a shotgun. The agents and Dreemurrs caught up behind Luna and drew magical lances and fireballs in return, bathing the lawn in a crackling orange and blue glow.

"Chara? Is that you? Get away from those monsters! It's not safe! Just come over here by Daddy, okay?"

"No!"

"Chara! Come back here before you get hurt!"

" _You and Mom are the ones who hurt me!_ "

Chara's father, stunned by his daughter's words, shifted his attention to Toriel and Asgore.

"You filthy creatures! What have you done to my daughter? What did you do to brainwash her like this, to make her think that she belongs with you?"

The fireball in Toriel's paw intensified, causing the group's shadows to dance among the other houses.

"You're the disgusting creatures, hurting an innocent child like that! Look at her arm! It's no wonder why our child ran away from you!"

"You don't know what you're talking about. You don't understand what those marks are!"

"I think we do, and you won't admit it!"

Luna, though slightly offended, maintained an air of professionalism and added, "Scars and burns? We're not idiots here, and we know exactly what's going on. It's what _you've_ done to them that's important here. We've simply come to help our allies rescue their child _as well as their child's brother._ "

"You aren't taking Anta! I'll shoot if you come any closer!"

Chara's father reached for a tiny lever just behind the firearm's trigger. The agents holding pikes responded by pointing their charged weapons toward the front porch.

"And we'll shoot back, step over your burnt corpse, and get Anta out of this nightmare of a household."

Before either of them could fire a shot, red and blue lights began to twinkle in the distance. A dozen police cars and an armored van drove up to the house and began to pour out officers. A helicopter appeared overhead and shined a circular spotlight directly on the monsters, illuminating their white faces against the blackness of night. In minutes, the monsters found themselves pinned between a police force and two enemies.

* * *

 _Mom and Dad charged out the front door, pointing magical weapons at the figure and demanding that it surrender. The figure refused and ran into a nearby alleyway. I saw my parents run into the same alleyway, chasing the figure on foot. I don't know exactly what happened during the next few quiet minutes, but then a police car sped lights flashing and siren blaring into the same alleyway and screeched to a halt. Curiosity got the best of me, so I ran barefoot over the frigid asphalt and hid behind the car, but then I heard several gunshots ring out. They were loud and horrible and each one made me flinch and cover my ears, but then they stopped too and I leaned out around the car's trunk._

 _"Mom? Dad? Are you okay?"_

 _There was no answer._

* * *

Luna felt sick to his stomach, hordes of angry voices throbbing in his head and blurring the surroundings. The blinding spotlight felt like lava on his skin.

"Get on the ground and keep your hands where I can see them!"

A group of officers ran toward the group with handcuffs that probably wouldn't have fit any of the monsters' wrists, but Luna, without thinking, telekinetically batted them away with a swipe of the paw. The rest of the police force drew guns, causing the agents to form a defensive ring around the Dreemurrs. The hidden carrier veered out of the helicopter's line of sight, stalking it like a bat following a juicy moth.

* * *

Helicopter 125 AT 500 DF

*1.50 km. away, 15 degrees of depression, winds 1 m/s. NNW.

*This is the highest-value target if fighting commences.

*It's midnight.

* * *

"No. Not you people. Not again. You stay away from my friends or I'll gut each and every one of you myself!"

"Drop your weapons! Now!"

* * *

 _At the very end of the corridor was that human figure, face twisted into a horrible grin. In front of him were the two police officers, guns still drawn and pointed at the creature. Two humans, a fugitive, and a split second to choose one or the other before they got me too._

* * *

" _Stay back!_ I won't let you hurt them!"

Luna stood between the agents and the police with a vortex in his paw and a badge held across his chest, fully prepared to disintegrate anyone who dared take a step forward. He locked eyes with the closest officer, thoughts of an exceedingly quick, easy revenge flowing through his mind.

"Wait! That's a shield! Hold your fire!"

Much to the goat commander's surprise, all of the police had lowered their firearms in unison. Following the closest officers' eyes, he noticed they were clearly staring at the handheld magic space vortex, but more importantly, they were gawking at the recognizable shield and star insignia. Even so, Luna wrapped his fingers tighter around the black sphere, expecting a shot to ring out at any second. He wouldn't be caught off guard again.

"So? Our precinct definitely didn't hire any of those talking goats!"

"Didn't you hear on the news about that treaty the suits signed with the monsters? I'm too old to get stuck in the middle of some international incident because one of you got too trigger-happy!"

Talking about the peace treaty was as far from opening fire as they could go. His parents were long gone, and so were their killers. As much as he hated to admit it, the officers in front of him now were innocent. Instead of with a flare to the neck, Luna replied, "Yes. Those monsters are the royal family of the Monster Kingdom. You saw the news from Switzerland; you know what that means. We're diplomats on official business here."

The agents lowered their weapons.

"There. No one is going to do anything hasty. 'Luna', lieutenant and acting commander of our present forces. We're just going to have a little department-to-department about the situation at hand. Why don't you guys start by explaining why the human police force is interfering with _our_ case?"

The officer in charge explained, "We got a call that some heavily armed monsters were trying to kidnap two human children, and lo and behold, a bunch of you are here with two little girls."

Luna replied, "Isn't that funny? We discovered that two humans were trying to kidnap the king and queen's adopted child, and the next thing we know, we're being surrounded like a bunch of terrorists."

"Those 'two humans' are Chara's parents, and our database shows no records of Chara ever having been adopted. I don't know the story behind the one holding a toy knife, but just return Chara to her parents and this little misunderstanding will be over. This doesn't have to become a big deal, so please just cooperate."

Chara burst out of the group, yelling at the officer, "But I don't want to go back to them! They hurt me so much, and these monsters are here to protect me!"

"I'm sorry, Chara, but those two are your parents and you have to go with them."

Chara showed the officers the scars on her arm, which disgusted them as much as it did the agents. The officer eventually regained his composure and, attitude beginning to shift, confronted Chara's parents.

"Is it true that you two did this—whatever this is—to Chara?"

"Of course not, and they can't prove a thing! For all we know, it was those monsters who did this to our daughter!"

"How dare you! We did nothing of the sort!"

"Look, Mr. Monster Detective, sir, unless you can prove that Chara's parents have abused their child and this mess is more than just a rebellious and possibly suicidal kid running away from home, you're going to have to surrender her to her parents. I know you have Chara's best interests at heart, but please try to understand our perspective here. It would be ridiculously irresponsible for us to let children run off with monsters without all of the facts."

Toriel, Asgore, and Asriel spoke up, pleading on behalf of their child.

"Officer, Chara ran away from home a long time ago. When she knocked on our door, she told us she was orphaned and needed a place to stay. We took her in, gave her a good home, and we've been a happy family ever since."

"We would have brought Chara back as soon as we found out her parents were still alive, but Chara told us all of the horrible things that they did to her. No child deserves to live in fear like that."

"Mister Police Guy, Chara's my sister and we've had so much fun together. If you send her back with them, you'll be taking my best friend away forever."

Asriel showed the officer a locket, nearly identical to the one Chara wore.

"Lies, lies, lies!"

Everyone stared at Chara's parents. With the pair of heart lockets greatly substantiating the idea of a happy human-monster mixed family, the battle lines were shifting rapidly. It was no longer possible to dismiss Toriel and Asgore's position simply because they had claws and horns.

"Don't you see, officer? They're just telling you stories so you won't feel bad. What about us? We provided our daughter with a roof over her head and clothes on her back and food for her stomach, didn't we? An abusive family would have just locked her in the basement like an animal! If you let those wackadoodle monsters keep Chara, you'll break up our family!"

"Who are you calling 'wackadoodle?'"

"You heard me! You're freaks of nature! All of you!"

"The only thing that's unnatural here is how you treat your own child!"

"You..."

"Will all of you just shut up and let me talk? What happens here is going to decide the rest of my life, and I clearly deserve a say in what happens to me!"

Everyone stopped bickering at once and stared at Chara.

"Mom, Dad, I spent years living in fear because of you, and I can't understand how you can keep denying the pain you've caused me. Why can't you two understand that I'm happy living with the monsters? Why can't you just let your daughter be happy like real parents should?"

Chara suddenly turned to the officer, eyes blazing with emotion.

"And you! Why do you keep trying to send me back with those horrible people? Aren't you supposed to be the good guys or something? What kind of 'guardian of peace' condemns a child to this kind of fate?"

"Look, kid, the laws say that those two are your parents and that we have to let you stay with them. We just don't have the proof to revoke their legal guardian status, and the law can't afford to make hasty mistakes. I'm sorry, but no amount of begging and pleading is going to change my mind. If you can't prove that your parents are unfit to be your legal guardians, then I'll have to ask your monster friends to leave or be charged with trespassing."

The monsters exchanged nervous glances with one another, desperately trying to arrive at a plan.

"Luna! You told us that most of the humans could be worked with! How could they even think about doing this to our daughter?"

"Look, I've been trying _really, really hard_ to make myself play nice with these people and even harder to make myself believe that I should. Give me one chance, and if that doesn't work, well, grab the kids and dive for cover."

(So that's it, huh? All this effort and they're just going to take Chara from the Dreemurrs.)

Luna glanced at Toriel and Asgore.

(This can't be the end. There has to be a way through, but tears and pleading won't work anymore.)

Luna turned and looked at Chara's parents.

(No, I can't kill them now, even though I'd give anything for a minute with them on an asteroid.)

Luna looked at Frisk.

(How do you do it? How did you manage to find a way out of everything that the Underground has thrown at you?)

Luna looked at Chara.

(Her injuries aren't decisive evidence by themselves. Maybe a DNA test, or a chemical test for Chara's blood in their house? No, wait, that would be far too easy for them to explain away.)

Luna looked at Asriel.

(They've really been through a lot, haven't they?)

(Wait a minute.)

( _They've_ been through a lot. That's it! I never thought this old thing would come in handy again, but this has to work!)

Luna produced from his phone a case file, a collection of documents and photographs from the M.B.'s rescue of Asriel and Chara from the old human village.

"If it's 'facts' you want, then have a look. This is a record of one of our cases, and therefore legal as evidence under humanity's treaty with the monsters."

(Thank you, Dreemurrs, for working that clause in. We owe you one.)

"Allow me to explain the situation that this portfolio refers to. At one point while Chara lived with the monsters, she got a nasty case of poisoning from buttercup flowers and her adoptive brother carried her into the nearby human village to find a doctor."

"Yes, and here it says all of the humans ambushed the two and left them to die. This is certainly a heinous act, and I assure you that those responsible will be held accountable, but what does it have to do with this case?"

"We know that village has since been flattened by an earthquake, but Chara's parents still lived there at the time of this incident. I am not claiming that Chara's parents contributed to the attempted murder, and there must have been a hundred people there in total and any combination of them could have been responsible, but any spot they could have been standing in would have given them a clear line of sight to their injured daughter."

"And it also says that your colleagues had to step in to save their daughter because none of the humans would help them. Apparently, some of them deliberately tried to sabotage your doctors' efforts to perform a life-saving operation."

"Precisely. This case file makes clear one fact, and that fact is that _Chara's parents did absolutely nothing to stop harm from coming to their daughter._ A caring parent in this situation would have tried to protect their child in any way they could, at least trying to convince the mob to stop if not shielding the child with their own body. Meanwhile, Chara's parents _just stood there._ Had we not arrived when we did, it is entirely plausible that they would have left either their child or their child's companion to _die_."

"So? What does that prove? We were afraid of the angry mob, too! Maybe you fleabags haven't had time to figure out how the world works after crawling out of your hole, but you can't arrest someone for walking past a bank robbery without stopping to help. Not everyone has to stand in front of bullets, you know!"

"Not to mention that we had our other child to protect!"

Luna snapped the file shut, stomped his foot on the ground, and glared into Chara's parents' eyes.

"Do you really think a crime's only a crime because words on a paper say so? Luckily for us—and unfortunately for _you_ —you've missed the point entirely and you're out of time. Officers! I'm not indicting Chara's parents for a double attempted murder, but based on the circumstances: Can you in good conscience declare those two fit to be legal guardians and send this child to live with them?"

Everyone stood utterly speechless, particularly Chara and Anta, both of whom only now discovered these details of that fateful day. Luna telekinetically grabbed Anta and pulled up his sleeve, revealing to the police the same scars that Chara bore.

"Can you in good conscience declare those two fit to be legal guardians and let their son, who has clearly suffered the same as Chara, continue living with them? Well? Can you?"

"I…um…no?"

Chara's mother, shocked, shouted, "What? But, we're the ones who called you out here! We're the people who needed help, so help us get rid of those marauding monsters!"

"Please calm down. We're figuring out this situation as best we can."

"Calm down? _Calm down?_ How can I calm down when the police are choosing a bunch of animals over the people they've sworn to protect and serve?"

"People, animals, or otherwise, madam, we must follow the proper legal protocols; given the facts, an official investigation must be completed. Mr. and Mrs. Dreemurr, there will be a jury trial to determine the future of Chara's biological parents' legal guardianship. They will be tried for multiple counts of child abuse, and if they are convicted, you two will likely become Chara's legal guardians. In the meantime, Chara and Anta will be placed in the care of the state until the date of the hearing."

"No, no, no!"

Chara's mother was fuming at the prospect of not only not regaining her lost child, but losing the one she still had.

"You monster! Look what you've done!"

Luna grinned victoriously and replied, "You humans are awfully fond of using that word as an insult, aren't you? There's only two monsters here in that sense of the word."

Chara's mother grew more frantic, now resembling a rabid, caged animal. Out of desperation, she pitched one last plea at her biological daughter.

"Chara! Come back! What happened to my little daughter? What did they do to you?"

"They've done more than you have to help me, Mom. It's over."

Chara's mother, on the brink of mental breakdown, wrestled the shotgun from her husband's arms and aimed at Luna. In a split second, police officers shouted at her to "drop her weapon" while the agents prepared to shoot back. Everything had been happening so fast and there was simply no time to dodge. A bullet, made even more powerful by sheer hatred, flew toward the alien commander's SOUL and hit a translucent red wall instead.

"Frisk?"

Frisk nodded and raised a toy knife, tip glowing red with determination.

Chara's mother fired a few more shots in a feeble attempt to shatter the barrier, the last of which went wide as officers tackled her to the ground.

"You idiot...you would have at least had a chance to force me to stay with you if you let the trial happen, but what do you think is going to happen now? They're going to charge you with attempted murder, Mom, and a hundred police officers witnessed the whole thing. You're going to be locked up for a long time, and after that little outburst of yours, there's no chance that Dad is going to win the battle for legal guardianship."

"The kid's right. For their well-being, it's safe to consider Mr. and Mrs. Dreemurr the official legal guardians here. Chara, there will still be a court date in the future, but you are free to go with your adoptive parents."

Luna raised a single claw and asked, "What exactly does a jury trial entail on Earth?"

The officer replied, "Chara's parents will go before a judge and body of their peers and stand trial for their charges in a court with the appropriate jurisdiction."

(Jurisdiction...The M.B. is supposed to have first crack at any criminals it goes after no matter where they are in the galaxy, especially when considering who the 'victims' are this time. Chara's parents should be going to _our_ courts for that murder charge, at least, but I better not raise a fuss and destabilize human-monster relations any further. Let's see how far I can stretch the diplomat card.)

"If you wouldn't mind, we'd like to observe how the human justice system operates. I'm sure the king and queen would like to ensure that the voice of monsters is heard even if it means serving as character witnesses."

"Very well then. I'll let the prosecutor in charge know."

Chara's mother and father were thrown into the back of a police car, leaving a confused Anta alone in the doorway.

"Anta, it's okay now. They're not going to bother us anymore. Come out! We can be a family again!"

Anta gingerly approached the group before giving his long-lost sister a hug.


	28. Home

The Sun dawned brighter than it ever had, appearing precisely where the road met the sky to bathe Chara's guardians in warm rays of golden light. Some commotion from the night before continued to linger as the small army of police officers packed up the last of their supplies, noise dying down as their helicopter droned off into the distance. Quiet and tranquility almost returned to the neighborhood, but Chara's brother was sniffling softly in her arms. The nightmare was dying with the night, and in its place, something sweeter than a lucid dream was being born.

Luna reached for Anta's shoulder, asking, "Is there anything you want me to get for you?" but the gesture made the child jerk back with enough force to knock Chara off her feet. It seemed that Anta would need some time to adapt to his new circumstances. He was, after all, being asked to move underground with his sister, her adoptive sister, and three goat monsters by yet more goat monsters.

"Frisk, maybe it would be more comfortable for him if you tried. I can hardly imagine what's racing through this kid's head right now."

Frisk nodded, walked slowly toward Anta, and said in a gentle voice, "Hi. My name's Frisk. What's your name?"

The child sniffled and replied, "I'm Anta."

"That's a nice name."

"It's a weird name made up by two people who spent every waking moment wasted and every other moment passed-out drunk. I hate it and everything it stands for. You were lucky; your name reflects how kind and understanding you are, and mine is nothing but evil and hatred and pain and suffering."

"Please don't say that. A name doesn't define who you are, but it's what the person with the name does that's important. Take that monster in the striped shirt who's at least nine times as adorable as the rest. His parents weren't the best with creative names and chose 'Asriel' by combining their own, but his character is an inspiration everywhere he goes. And as for the monster with the holographic computer trying really hard to pretend he doesn't hear me, his parents named him Luna, which is pretty hard to beat as weird names go."

"But…isn't that a girl's name?"

* * *

Anta HP: 52/60

*Your curiosity is tingling almost as much as your ears are.

*Upright red SOUL.

* * *

"A girl's na—w _hat_? Yes, I heard you. Come now, I won't bite!"

"Why did you help me, even after I hurt Chara and stole your spaceship and caused all of that trouble with the cops?"

"You couldn't be held completely responsible for your actions after spending years living in fear, especially when there were _much, much bigger fish_ to fry at the time. Many victims defend their abusers because they depend on them for things like food and shelter, and you were clearly no exception."

Chara's brother still had a noticeable amount of tension in his hands and shoulders. Seemingly, the fight and the hand motions and the memory of gripping and firing from the light spear affected him most of all.

"Hey, kid. I'm not mad at you. It was only a matter of time before our cover was blown, anyway, and teenagers like taking joyrides. It's a fact that crosses species lines and yours just happened to be in a highly advanced cockpit instead of behind a wheel. That was one heck of a wipeout, too; let me see if I can't patch you up a little."

The alien waved a green light over the child's face, watching eagerly as a faint crack of a smile replaced the semi-closed knife wound. Anta still seemed unsure of himself. He turned longingly toward the now-deserted, silent home he had just slept in twenty-four hours ago. If Chara leaving felt like a bandage, leaving now would feel like a bandage made of super-glue and duct tape.

"Chara, dear, could I have a closer look at your arm?"

Chara approached her mother and stuck out both her arms, allowing Toriel to take her hands with one paw while feeling around with the other. Showing disgust now would only frighten Chara further, so instead, she showed her curiosity.

"Gorey? Luna? Can you come over here?"

Everyone crowded around Chara. Asgore repeated his wife's motions and came to the same conclusion while Luna jotted as many notes as he could into his device. Asking Chara to turn slightly towards the sun, the goat commander finished with a photograph of the discoloration. Perhaps it was just the stress of last night, but it almost seemed as if the marks formed deliberate lengthwise trails, like curved flames and streaks running up and down Chara's tattered arm. Toriel tried a healing light, but it left the hypothesized pattern completely unchanged.

"These marks…your skin…the scars are rough, but the black spots feel just as smooth as, well, skin."

Either impatient or just tired, Chara broke away from the group and sought out her brother.

"I know you wanted to do what was best for me."

"It's just…Dad's still Dad, you know? And once this blows over, he'll be all alone here."

"You know it in your heart that it isn't safe here anymore. You protected me all these years; please, let me protect you for once. Come live with us."

"I don't know, sis…how would I even fit in? Don't you think they'd be mad at me after trying to make off with their little princess?"

"Come on…do those monsters look like they hold grudges?"

Every goat monster present gave the friendliest possible wave they could. Toriel and Asgore whispered something to each other.

"We stand by our words last night, and we will care for you in any way that you need. You have probably heard a lot of nasty things about us, but do you think you could give us a chance?"

"Um…do I have to start calling you 'Mom' and 'Dad' now?"

"Not at all, my child. If these arrangements still make you uncomfortable, perhaps we can 'rearrange' them…how about a job offer?"

"Mrs. Dreemurr—I mean, Your Highness—I mean…wait, what?"

"It just so happens that the Royal Scientist has _just_ begun searching for a laboratory assistant and we think you will be an excellent candidate for the position. Think not of it as leaving your home; rather, you are on a business trip to a state-of-the-art facility, the benefits include room, board, healthcare, and extremely flexible hours, and your sister happens to live nearby."

"Her Highness isn't kidding about state-of-the-art, either," Luna embellished. "Do you think my fighter designed itself?"

"Well…I guess you all did take care of Chara for all this time…okay. You win."

"Nice. If you're ready, I have a carrier ship waiting in the wings."

A larger spaceship, roughly five times the size of one of the starfighters, gently touched down and flattened Chara's neighbor's front lawn. Everyone except two agents climbed on board and departed for Mount Ebott, followed closely by two starfighters. While the commander busied himself with characteristic maintenance tasks, Anta seemed to be fascinated by all of the technology on board. Pretty soon, curiosity led to snooping and snooping led to touching.

* * *

Carrier Ship 0 AT DF=1500

*The caprines' standard cargo transport and ground support craft.

*Length: 40 m.

*Width: 24 m.

*Vertical takeoff and hovering capabilities.

*Maximum speed: 150 m/s. As with the starfighters, G-Forces and the problem of things sliding around everywhere are handled by computer-controlled gravitational field emitters.

*Shares the fighters' cloaking ability.

*Power source: Hydrogen Fusion Reactor providing 120 hours of flight time at full capacity. Modified to conceal heat signature.

*Wormhole generator installed, allowing teleportation at a maximum range of roughly one solar system.

*Cargo varies but always includes light and heavy weapons to be used mid-flight if necessary, medical supplies, magically-prepared food, hydrogen plasma, maintenance equipment, communications devices, parachutes, and survival gear. A large space in the middle had been cleared for the totaled starfighter.

*Not included are anti-aircraft weapons, so Carrier Ships fly with a fighter escort at all times. If you look out one of the hatches right now, you'll see a flying goat nestled in a fighter cockpit.

* * *

Seeing Chara's brother dart around the cargo bay brought warm smiles to Toriel and Asgore's faces.

"I'm glad to see that Chara's brother is moving past the bad memories and enjoying himself. Hopefully the adjustment to our home won't be too difficult for him."

"It looks like science and technology are Anta's closest comforts. As long as he has those, he should be fine. That 'lab assistant' angle…crafty move, by the way."

Mount Ebott appeared on the horizon. The carrier ship landed, Luna waved goodbye to the other agents, and everyone started walking to the caverns. Just before they disappeared underground, Asriel tugged on Luna's arm.

"No, Asriel, we will not make him jump into the Ruins even if he's technically a surface dweller. I can still hear the sound my legs made and it's the second worst thing I've ever heard."

The smells of butterscotch and cinnamon danced around everyone's noses and waved them into New Home. Toriel showed Anta where his sister slept while Luna poked his head over her shoulder. On the left was a bunk bed and on the right was a single bed, and presumably, the three children fought over who slept where each and every night. Ironically enough, one of the beds had a stuffed animal lying next to the pillow. There was also a dresser next to one of the beds and a shelf with a picture frame on it; behind the frame was a cyan, fluorescent spear, a polished white bone wrapped with a bow, the faint purple glow of the replica dark energy sword, and a variety of other gifts given by the monsters.

Luna smiled. The frame had a photo of the Dreemurrs taken just after the barrier broke.

"We'll get a bed built by the end of the day, but in the meantime, would you like to see the rest of the Underground?"

Instead of an answer, all four children replied by crashing onto the nearest bed and falling into a sound sleep. Once they slept away yesterday's long night, everyone left for Hotland. All of the puzzles that could be reset had reset themselves, which Luna thought would be a serious health risk given the ambient temperature. Much to his surprise, Chara's brother solved each and every one of them between New Home and the laboratory in less than ten seconds apiece.

"Hey! Anyone home? I don't know if you saw that, but we just found you a lab assistant!"

Alphys answered the door momentarily.

"Greetings, Your Majesty, Commander, Frisk, Chara...who's this?"

"My name's Anta; I'm Chara's brother. Sorry if I made it so you have to invent a bunch of harder puzzles now."

"No, it's all right. Those puzzles are more of a cultural thing than an actual form of security. Anyways, is it true that you wanted to help around the lab?"

"Yes! I mean, um...yes, I'd love to learn more about the research monsters are doing now."

Gaster overheard Alphys, introduced himself to Anta, and invited him to take a look at one of the new contraptions he was building.

"He should be happy here. Now that that's taken care of...Alphys, do you remember that little detail we went over the last time I was here?"

"Yes, um...I haven't told anyone, if that's what you wanted to know."

"I've been thinking it over, and they deserve to know too. Before the rest of the M.B. finds out, I mean."

"Okay then."

Alphys motioned for the Dreemurrs to follow her to a comfortable couch. It would be safer if they were already sitting down beforehand.

"I asked Luna for a DNA sample and the results were interesting, to say the least. I don't have enough conclusive evidence to say for sure, but there is a strong possibility that you three share a common ancestor with him."

"Are you sure, doctor? We'd clearly know if part of the Dreemurr Family Tree came from space, and the only time the history books mention anything like aliens is the prophecy where an angel who's seen the surface frees the monsters."

"Heh, I'm no angel, and I'm saying this before he gets the chance to say that I'm the angel."

Luna took the words right out of a now indignant Asriel's mouth. Meanwhile, Chara and Frisk high-fived each other.

"I knew it! Long live the fluffy goat family!"

"Let's not get carried away here. The two of us haven't proven _that_ kind of relationship, but the more we talk about it, the harder it's getting to deny the connection between the caprines and your family. I'll work with Dr. Alphys to uncover more details, but I'm not that comfortable with you looking at me like I'm Asriel's brother or something."

"Family or not, Luna, you're a friend. You've done so much more for us than anyone should ever have to and we can't ever repay you enough."

"Don't worry about it. None of you owe me anything."

(But if Anta would like to chip in for his trigger happiness earlier, I wouldn't mind...)

The alien sat down next to Toriel and finally got to enjoy a few hours of relaxation. They chatted about the current state of relations with the humans and watched the news on Alphys's giant television; to Luna's slight disappointment, the top stories were about the standoff with Chara's parents and sightings of a mystery aircraft over a quiet suburb. Opting to avoid killing the good spirits, they switched to anime and then listened to thrilling PG field stories from the commander himself. When evening rolled around, they went back to New Home, where a few carpenters had finished converting the single bed in Asriel and Chara's room into a bunk bed.

"Might want to hit the hay a little early tonight. There'll be a lot of investigating and questions in the coming days."

"Oh, dear! We forgot to ask them to build a guest bed! Maybe—"

"You don't need to go through all that trouble for me. I'll find a spot for myself."

"But you're our guest. It wouldn't be right if—"

"Those starfighters are _not_ roomy. After spending hours at a time in the same area as a postage stamp, believe me when I claim that I can basically fall asleep anywhere. Good night, sleep tight, et cetera..."

Luna walked straight into Asriel's room, folded his scarf and a few square meters of carpet into a pile, and curled up on top of it as if he was a kitten. The Dreemurr children tucked themselves into their beds and drifted off into a sound sleep.

* * *

The window was open. Footsteps echoed in the pitch-blackness of the caves.

Luna found himself standing alone in the middle of the road in front of the M.B. Earth Office. All of the buildings were dark and the air felt as icy as the street felt lonely. Besides the dim glow from the Moon, the only light came from a metal lamp post at the end of the block. Squinting hard, the alien could barely make out two outlines of agents sprinting through the light and behind the corner of a building.

"Hey! Wait up!"

When they moved out of sight, Luna started running after the agents and nearly tripped when he heard a grisly scream. By the time he rounded the corner, whatever they were chasing had vanished without a trace. Instead, the two agents stood motionless on the sidewalk with their backs turned to him.

"Why didn't you help us?" they asked.

"I came as fast as I could. Any idea where they went?"

"Why'd you let them kill us?"

Luna looked confused.

"What? What are you talking about?"

The two agents turned slowly, letting Luna take a good look at his parents' faces.

"Mom? Dad?"

Luna's parents took a few steps toward him, but there was something strange about their gait. They were definitely walking and talking, but their movements seemed more akin to cold, rigid bodies than to living monsters. He'd rather not get a closer look, but the skin under their ragged hides seemed almost cyanotic.

"What's going on?"

"You disgrace...you failure...how could you just let your own family die? Why didn't you save us, Luna? Why did you hide behind the car?"

"I'm sorry! It all happened so quickly and I didn't know what to do! Please…don't be mad at me…I can…I won't let anyone die next time!"

With an unnatural stretching sound, the two monsters' faces contorted into twisted grins and purple, oozing cracks formed in their heads.

"Wait...no...stay back!"

They suddenly lunged claws-out at Luna's throat, corrupted bodies shattering into dust as their frigid paws touched his face. The fine powder covered Luna from head to toe, leaving him yelping and scratching and frantically brushing off the dust as if it was a swarm of fire ants.

Someone behind him shouted "Help me!", voice piercing the blowing wind and bouncing off buildings such that it assaulted his ears from every direction at once.

Luna turned around, and standing there was a familiar-looking human soldier with a pistol in their hand. It was aimed not at the alien, but at Frisk's cowering head.

"I know you can hear me. Put the gun down and we can talk about this, okay?"

Still fixated on their hostage, they didn't respond to the alien's words in the slightest. Only the hostage, reaching out with her hand, seemed aware of the goat monster's existence.

"So, you think you're one of the monsters, don't you? You've been helping them a lot so far..."

"Let her go! What would your two daughters think if they saw this?"

Frisk tried to struggle out of the headlock, but the human child was more than a few fights short of being a burly wrestler. She reached for the toy knife and jabbed at the soldier, but they laughed and knocked it away.

"Let go of me!"

"There's only one thing a _traitor_ deserves. Maybe in your next life you'll know which team you're supposed to be on."

The alien snapped his fingers and sprung forward for a wormhole-assisted tackle, only to be stopped in his tracks by a bullet. A few drops of blood splattered onto the asphalt, followed by the thud of a body.

"Frisk!"

Luna blew away the soldier with an overcharged black hole to the heart, leaped to Frisk's side, removed his scarf, and wrapped it around the child's head. He started applying a green light from his paw to the wound, but it wouldn't close and the child's breathing kept growing more erratic.

"Just hold on! Help will be here soon!"

Frisk clung to the alien with the last of her strength, trembling with each word.

"It's so cold...I..."

"Cold? Here, let me..."

Luna tried to shield Frisk from the cold wind with the warmth of his own body, hoping against all logic that it would be enough to keep her alive until help arrived.

"I'm sorry...it hurts...I can't..."

"Don't give up! Please!"

There was a cracking sound. Luna found himself alone once more in the moonlit street.

* * *

"He's having a nightmare, isn't he?"

Chara and Anta had awoken and were standing before the alien, whose face was tensed into a grimace. His paws were clutching the scarf as if the world would implode if he didn't hold it tightly enough.

"Yep. Grab his legs; we're putting him in _my_ bed tonight. Now move over; you're sharing yours too."

The two slowly and carefully lifted the alien and tucked him into one of the lower beds. Chara knelt down by the sleeping alien and, remembering something that worked in a distant memory, started stroking his head, softly whispering, "The night can't last forever, Luna. Stay determined. It'll all be over soon."


	29. Adversarial

A carrier ship touched down in a grassy square across the street from a grand white building. With its polished marble staircase, ancient Roman-style columns, and blindfolded swordswoman statue, the courtroom certainly looked the part of a bulwark of justice. Luna quietly peeked out of a window and ducked back, feeling a headache coming on when he saw a small army of reporters filing out of a fleet of news vans.

"Are you sure you want to be here today, Commander? You seem a little tired. Why don't you go back to New Home to rest up? I'll make you some tea if you want."

Luna looked up from his mug of coffee, shook his head and insisted, "I'm fine. I just didn't sleep as well as I'd thought. Strange, it's never been like this for a whole week before."

Chara tugged on his arm.

"We know you had a pretty nasty nightmare last night. If this day's going to be hard for us, I'm worried it'll be absolutely unbearable for you."

(Do I really look so exhausted that the _victim_ is trying to comfort me?)

"Oh, please. Today was going to be an ordeal whether I slept like a log or on one. They'll ask you to dig up painful memories, Chara, with the precision and grace of a sledgehammer. Now let's finish this before they figure out we're in here."

A cargo bay door hissed and opened, and out of the fog stepped the outlines of four monsters and three humans. As they crossed the asphalt, tons of reporters flocked over to the group and their fully visible, shiny, and smoky transportation and collided into a line of bailiffs. One of them motioned for the group to follow as their colleagues tried to part the sea of press hats and flashing cameras.

"Mr. Dreemurr! What do the monsters have to say now that they've finally returned to the surface? Do your subjects harbor any ill will toward humanity? What's your perspective on today's trial?..."

"If you'll just step this way, your Highness! I apologize for the commotion, but you can imagine that this is an extremely unprecedented trial. I can imagine the headlines already: 'Monsters Take on Humans in Pitched Legal Battle!"

"I'm surprised they aren't afraid of us. It looks like the humans have come a long way toward starting to trust us, Luna."

"...Will diplomacy prevail if you win the right to care for the human children? Will the war resume if Chara's parents are acquitted? Is it true that monsters have magic powers? And what about the rumors saying monsters can steal human souls? Where did the monsters get that spaceship?..."

"Or maybe they're asking a billion questions because they _don't_ trust us. You can win the political and legal battles for rights and protection with time and effort, but you won't win the social battle for acceptance unless the press is on your side. I'll get them to quiet down, and then you can say a few words to them."

When the monsters made it to the highest step, Luna waved and jumped around until people started turning their heads in the right direction.

"Can I have your attention, please? As the King of the Monsters, I promise you that all of your questions will be answered at a later time. There will be a conference and we'll be glad to tell you all about the monsters there."

Everyone disappeared into the building, leaving the reporters clamoring outside of the polished wooden doors.

"Now if you could remove any metal you're holding onto and walk through these detectors, and then the courtroom will be right through the wooden double doors at the end of the hall."

The machine's operator gawked as a golden crown, two golden lockets, two knives, and a space pike made their way through the conveyor belt.

"No weapons in the courtroom, please."

Luna asked the four children "Why don't I hold onto these?" and dumped the knives and the spear into a wormhole leading back to the carrier ship for safekeeping. The actual courtroom was rather cozy compared to the hard exterior of the building, with blue carpeted floors and shined wooden walls. All of the furniture, including the judge's bench, jury box, lawyers' benches, and audience's chairs were made of the same mahogany. Even though the seats were packed with spectators and reporters, there were a handful reserved directly behind the prosecutor's bench.

"So how exactly do these trials work?"

"Chara's brother probably knows a bit more about human courts than I do, your Highness."

"The most important concept is that there is a prosecutor who tries to prove the accused's guilt and a defense attorney who tries to prove otherwise. Both lawyers present evidence, interview witnesses, and build their opposing arguments as the trial proceeds. The jury; that is, the twelve people in the seats off to the side, will decide if their accused peer is guilty while the judge oversees the proceedings and asks questions to clarify the arguments."

Anta concluded his little explanation with a subtle fist pump.

"It's a battleground like no other, and it works a lot like how our own courts used to. In fact, here come the lawyers now."

* * *

Devin Clark 40 AT 40 DF

*LV 3.

*Dark blue upright SOUL.

*World-famous prosecutor smiling and waving to the cameras as if they were puppies. The bailiffs weren't joking when they said this case was high-profile.

* * *

Elena Rockefeller 40 AT 40 DF

*LV 3.

*Purple upright SOUL.

*Public defender. You wonder if she truly believes in her clients' innocence or if it's just part of her job.

* * *

"All rise. The First District Court of the United Nations of Earth is now in session, the Honorable Judge Thompson presiding."

Everyone rose from their seats as an elderly man in a charcoal grey robe entered from a side door and sat down behind the middle bench.

* * *

Gerry Thompson 31 AT 35 DF

*LV 2.

*Yellow upright SOUL. Quite appropriate for a judge.

*That gavel's probably worth a +1 AT.

* * *

The judge cleared his throat and, in an imposing voice, dictated, "Today's case is the United Earth Government versus Charlie S. and Clarine S. Teller. The charges are two counts of child abuse each and one count of attempted murder for Mrs. Teller. As you are all well aware, this trial will be different in that it will be the first to involve the citizens of the Monster Kingdom and I've made a special exception in allowing the proceedings to be televised. Before we begin, do the monsters have anything they would like to say?"

Everyone stared at the row behind the prosecutor's bench. The Dreemurrs whispered among themselves for a moment and then Asgore nodded and stood up.

"This will be the first time any monster has the privilege of witnessing the humans' justice system as well as the first time a monster will be involved in the legal process. Even though there are only two defendants behind that desk, it would be wise to remember that the future of our civilizations is standing trial as well."

"Indeed. The proceedings of this trial will affect human-monster relations for decades to come, so I expect everyone here to maintain the sanctity of the law to their highest ability. A 'good, clean fight,' as they say. We will first address the attempted murder charge brought against Mrs. Teller. Is the prosecution ready to deliver the opening statement?"

Mr. Clark shuffled some papers, stood up, and strolled into the middle of the courtroom.

"Yes, Your Honor. Two days ago, there was a confrontation between the Tellers and the monsters just outside of the Tellers' house. The topic of their dispute was over custody of the Tellers' two biological children, and with such a touchy subject, it was no wonder that the conflict escalated quickly. Several platoons of police officers were dispatched to the scene, but they were unable to curb the rising tension. The arguments continued until Mrs. Teller picked up a shotgun and fired multiple shots at that monster wearing the red scarf. Luckily, 'Luna' survived and is here to testify today. It is the prosecution's belief that Mrs. Teller fired with the intent of cold-blooded murder."

"I see. With over a hundred police officers present, it is an undeniable truth that Mrs. Teller discharged a firearm several times in an attempt to harm, erm...'Luna'."

The judge murmured something to himself and stopped to adjust his glasses, making sure that the words coming out of his mouth actually matched the file in front of him.

"Hmm…I think my old neighbor had a cat named Luna."

After everyone settled down, Mr. Clark asked a bailiff to wheel in a cart with the shotgun and several spent bullet casings wrapped in individual plastic baggies, explaining, "Luckily for us, the forensics team dropped everything they were doing to get this investigation done. The prosecution would like to present the firearm in question and its fired bullets. Forensics has already conducted a fingerprint test on the weapon and discovered a set matching the defendant's."

"The court accepts the weapon and bullets into evidence. Now, is the defense ready to give its opening statement?"

Mrs. Rockefeller stepped into the spotlight in an equally composed manner and said, "Yes, Your Honor. While the defense does not deny the fact that Mrs. Teller fired at that monster on that night, it claims that Mrs. Teller acted in self-defense. In other words, the accused was justified in her actions because the monsters posed a legitimate threat to the safety of her husband and children."

Luna made a face asking the equivalent of "On what planet was that self-defense?", only to be interrupted by Mrs. Rockefeller calling him to the witness stand. After pointing at himself for a second with "Me?" written on his face, the alien made his way over to a booth beside the judge's bench and waited as a bailiff approached the stand with a thick book.

"Do you swear to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?"

"Of course."

"Mrs. Rockefeller, you may proceed."

The lawyer walked to the stand, returned Luna's glare with her own, and asked, "Will you please state your name and occupation for the record?"

"My name is Luna. I am a…'detective.' Yes, that's it, a detective with a really fancy airplane."

"And you are a monster?"

"Either that or I'm wearing a _very_ realistic goat costume."

"Can you explain to the court how you and your colleagues found yourselves in a suburban human neighborhood on that night?"

"Chara and Anta Dreemurr—"

"Please refrain from using that surname until the custodial dispute has been resolved."

Luna folded his arms and replied, "And so what if I call them a certain name? It doesn't change who was involved or what transpired that night."

"I understand, but—"

" _Or are you afraid that name will convince the jury to come to its senses and side with the children?"_

The judge looked over his bench and said, "The jury is instructed to disregard the previous statement. Witness, please do not pick fights with the counsel and just answer the question."

"My apologies, Your Honor. Now, as I was saying, Anta showed up at Mount Ebott to convince Chara to leave with him, but we discovered that both children were victims of abuse during their arguments. Anta fled in one of our spacecraft, so we had no choice but to pursue him to the Teller household. When we arrived, the Tellers burst out of their front door and pointed the shotgun at me. The police arrived momentarily, and after some more arguing, she fired at me several times."

Mr. Clark waved his hand in a flourish and added, "As you can see, Mrs. Teller had aimed her weapon with the intent to hit the monster. Why would anyone point a gun at anyone else if not to shoot them?"

Mrs. Rockefeller adjusted her glasses and firmly laid a hand on the witness stand.

"Witness, what you just said doesn't make any sense. If the defendant was actually aiming at you, then how is it that you're here, testifying before us, without an impact wound or even the slightest scratch?"

"Defense, the monsters you see today aren't the same monsters whom humanity defeated years ago. Is it not appropriate to assume they've gotten stronger and learned a few new tricks?"

"What kind of trick could possibly allow him to survive at such a close range?"

"Mrs. Rockefeller, the focus of the trial is not how the witness managed to dodge bullets. The relevant facts here are that Mrs. Teller aimed at the witness and attempted to shoot him with no provocation. In other words, this is the dictionary definition of a _mens rea_ and therefore, Mrs. Teller is guilty of attempted murder!"

It was no great leap for the jury to understand Mr. Clark's claim, and hearing their murmuring brought a smug smile to the alien's face. However, the defender caught him off guard by having a cart with a familiar-looking weapon wheeled in.

"Not so fast, Clark. Defense Exhibit 'A'. Witness, isn't it true that you and your friends were carrying, um…'spears of various sizes'?"

"Yes, and judging by what happened, I'd say bringing them was the right idea."

"All the more reason the defendant had no reason to perceive immediate danger. They're just spears, Rockefeller, not machine guns."

"Are they just spears? If their weapons were unremarkable sharpened metal rods, the monsters would have been at an enormous disadvantage against firearms. The fact they wielded them anyway all but proves their weapons were _at least_ as strong as guns if not outclassing them outright. Well, witness? Answer honestly, now, are those spears really 'just spears'?"

"…no."

"Your friends had their non-spears pointed at the defendant, didn't they?"

"Hmph. So, this is what you meant by self-defense."

"Answer the question, witness."

"Fine. Yes. Happy now?"

"Please describe your friends' weapons to the court."

Rockefeller had him caught in a snare made from words, and it was much too late to wriggle out of his own testimony now. However, characterizing their standard weapons as directed-energy doom staves would invite unwanted attention, incite fear—any manner of visceral reaction would certainly damage the monsters' image. After mulling it over, he settled on three words he hoped were neither too advanced nor alarming.

"They launch plasma."

"Plasma! Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, wouldn't you be terrified if you saw a bunch of figures sneaking through the night holding that kind of space-age hardware? Mrs. Teller certainly was, and it's obvious she only fired because the combined sight of the monsters and their weapons panicked her!"

Over the rising murmurs of the jury, the prosecutor shouted, "But that argument holds for the monsters, who were just as startled when the defendant suddenly pulled a gun on them. The only difference is that the monsters had the restraint to not shoot anybody! How is it that the monsters felt calmer than the human on our own territory after all we did to them?"

"Order! Order! As the facts of the case stand, both parties had drawn weapons against each other. Whether this is a sufficient condition to claim justified self-defense will be left to the jury to decide, but I believe the defense has another claim they would like to present."

"Thank you, Your Honor. The defense would like to call Toriel Dreemurr to the stand."

Luna stepped down and passed a surprised-looking queen of the monsters, whispering, "I don't like her, I don't trust her, and I can't understand how she could vouch for those two without some dirty trick, but no matter what, she can't change the truth."

Toriel sat down behind the stand, placed a paw on the thick book, and swore to tell the whole truth.

"Please state your name and occupation."

"My name is Toriel Dreemurr. I am the queen of the Monster Kingdom."

"Were you present with the previous witness on the night in question?"

"Yes."

"The officers told me about an interesting sight they had. They, naturally, confirmed you were there, but they also said you had a _glowing ball of fire_ above your hand. Can you elaborate on what they said?"

Toriel produced an identical fireball right there in the courtroom and calmly explained, "All monsters are capable of using magic."

"What you are saying is proof positive that all of the recently freed monsters do indeed possess magical powers. Are you absolutely sure of this?"

"Yes."

Toriel could have sworn she heard a cracking sound, but the only one dying in the courtroom was the second greatest rumor surrounding the mysterious monsters from underground. Magic was as real as the chairs under the jury's rear ends and a few living, breathing examples were mere feet from them.

"Can you describe in detail how your magic works?"

"Objection! This court doesn't have time for a full-blown documentary about the monsters!"

"I agree with the prosecution. Regardless of the technical details, the queen's testimony has revealed that she produced a fireball in her hand on the night of the incident. The king has already explained that he will answer questions specifically about monsters at a later time."

Rockefeller looked disappointed, but continued, "Nevertheless, fireballs work like fire balls, right? You were going to attack the Tellers with magic, weren't you?"

The words fell like torches onto the carpeted floor. Each second of stunned silence felt like an eternity and each stare burned like sunlight through a magnifying class. The entire courtroom hanged delicately from a single thin rope caught in the glass's focus.

"It wasn't like that. I just wanted to keep my family safe—"

(I just wanted to keep her safe!)

"How incredibly convenient. Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, the only reason the witness would need to have a fireball on that night is to lob it right into someone's face! It doesn't matter how many guns were there and who they were pointed at because the monsters are the equivalent of _living weapons!_ With their magical powers, they could have attacked the Tellers whenever they wanted. Clearly, Mrs. Teller was observant enough to understand the imminent danger and did what she had to do to protect her own family."

The rope snapped.

"No! Wait! I didn't want to hurt anyone!"

(No! Wait! I didn't hurt Chara!)

"I object! The defense is slandering the witness!"

"You had the equivalent of an incendiary device in your hand, witness, and that's an undeniable fact. If you weren't going to burn somebody, then what else were you going to possibly going to do with it?"

"You have to believe me! Monsters would never try to hurt people!"

(Please believe me! I'd never try to hurt my best friend!)

Points and whispers became cascades of shouting and bickering. Toriel couldn't pick out complete thoughts from her spot behind the stand, but most of the twelve people hastily shifted their gazes away from her pleading eyes every time she glanced at them.

"You were going to kill her if things didn't go your way, weren't you?!"

" _Chara! Run!"_

"No! Asriel! Chara! Wait!"

Several clacks from the gavel echoed around the wooden walls interspersed with shouts of "Order!," but it was a single desk slam followed by a forceful "Enough!" from the prosecutor's bench that quieted the courtroom down. During the commotion, Luna had made his way out of his seat and whispered something into Mr. Clark's ear.

"Excuse me, witness, that is the prosecutor's bench."

The goat monster started to apologize again, absent-minded expression as if he had been caught escaping a zoo enclosure, but Mr. Clark stood up and claimed, "It's all right, your Honor, I've decided to retain a 'consultant' in case matters of magic are brought up again."

"I'll allow it. The defense may also retain a consultant if it so desires."

One-third publicity stunt, one-third cover for the monster, and one-third tactical one-up against Rockefeller, who no monster on the face of the universe had a vested interest in aiding. Either way, the prosecutor was happy to have another resource and the goat detective was happy to help put the Tellers away.

"While you were all embarrassing this courtroom in front of our guests, one of the monsters has brought up a flaw in the defense's argument. A 'fundamental misunderstanding of the nature of magic,' if you will. The prosecution believes it is necessary for Mrs. Dreemurr to provide a brief expert testimony in order to clarify the proceedings."

"Very well then. I ask everyone to listen carefully and without interruptions. This court will not tolerate another episode of mayhem, nor will it allow all monsters to be unfairly defamed."

"Magic doesn't work like some kind of secret weapon that monsters can spring onto unsuspecting victims whenever they feel like it. It flows through our minds and bodies like blood, and it changes as our minds and bodies change. Magic is weaker the less we wish to fight, and it would take nothing less than a life-or-death situation for a monster to be able to strike with deadly force. Even in those extreme circumstances, most monsters are _still_ extremely hesitant to fight and won't react with their full power."

"I object. The defense questions the credibility of this expert testimony. How can we trust someone so closely involved with the case to be unbiased?"

"Hmph. Did you forget this case is being televised around the world? I have no doubt some of the monsters are using their freedom to enjoy a spot of TV, and I'm sure any of them would be willing to come here and confirm Mrs. Dreemurr's explanation. Witness, did the defendant ever point the shotgun at you?"

"No."

"Do you understand now, Rockefeller? Based on the testimony regarding who the guns were being aimed at, the witness's life wasn't directly being threatened. Her fireball would _not_ have been strong enough to place the defendant in imminent danger and therefore, Mrs. Teller has no basis to claim self-defense!"

"But a fellow monster's life was indeed being threatened. Given the emotional stress posed by the situation and the witness's status as a queen and a mother, it's entirely possible that seeing a fellow monster in danger would have been enough to make the fireball lethal. Besides; Mrs. Teller didn't know about this caveat to magic and had no choice but to assume the fireball was deadly. Even if the monsters weren't looking to harm the Tellers, the defendant had no choice but to believe otherwise, and therefore, the claim of self-defense still stands!"

Murmurs. Clacks. Even though Toriel looked like she saw Chara's ghost, Mr. Clark didn't seem nearly as worried as someone whose entire premise had been overturned.

"This line of questioning has hit a standstill and new facts need to be considered. Witness, please testify about what happened after you produced a fireball."

"After a few tense moments, a small army of police officers arrived and drew their guns. Everyone was talked into lowering their weapons at about the same time, and the arguments continued. All of a sudden, Mrs. Teller picked up the shotgun and fired."

Toriel didn't understand why the court fell silent again, nor did she understand why Mr. Clark and Luna were beaming while Mrs. Rockefeller looked flustered.

"This is the end of the line, defense. Would you care to explain the significance of that piece of testimony, or will I?"

"Ngrk..."

"Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, we've now unearthed the final piece of information this case is hiding from us. While it is true that the defendant had her weapon drawn against the monsters' own variety of weapons, the actual act of firing the shotgun _did not_ occur until the monsters had lowered theirs and police officers had surrounded the house. In that instant, Mrs. Teller had absolutely no reason to suspect a threat of _immediate violence from the monsters_ , and therefore, this incident was _not_ a matter of self-defense!"

"But we've seen that all monsters are capable of magic in lethal proportions. Even with weapons lowered, they could have attacked at any moment!"

"That's speculation!"

Clack.

"It seems the court will need more information in order to continue the proceedings. Witness, did anything else happen during the incident?"

"No. Between Anta, the chase, the guns, the police, the arguing, and the shots, nothing else happened."

"Then with all the details clear, I am ready to bring this trial to a close. Does either counsel have any final remarks regarding the case?"

"No, Your Honor. The prosecution believes it has made the invalidity of self-defense clear."

"The defense still believes it has sufficiently established a valid claim to self-defense."

"Very well then. As all of the facts have now been examined, I will now summarize what I believe to be the sequence of events that transpired on the night of the incident. First, Anta entered the Monster Kingdom with the goal of convincing Chara to return with home with him, fleeing with one of the monsters' spacecraft when Chara refused. The monsters followed him to the Teller household, and they and Mrs. Teller drew either firearms or fireballs against each other. The police arrived soon and everyone was convinced to lower their weapons, and after more disagreement, Mrs. Teller fired her weapon at one of the monsters. These events have been confirmed by multiple police reports, which will be made available for the jury during deliberations. As it now stands, the jury's first duty is to evaluate whether Mrs. Teller's actions were justified under the principle of self-defense. This court will reconvene after a thirty-minute recess in order to address the remaining charges. Witness, you may now step down from the stand."

"Toriel! Are you all right? You looked like you were going to faint up there."

"I'm fine, but...where are Asgore and the children?"


	30. Adversity

Toriel and the alien burst out of the courtroom and surveyed the length of the building. The wooden doors to all other courtrooms were closed and guarded by bailiffs, suggesting other trials were in progress. They would have known if two children crashed the proceedings.

"What if they ran outside?"

Reporters were jamming every door leading out of the building with microphones and camera equipment. The kids were fast, to be sure, but they couldn't possibly have learned how to teleport to the next building over during the murder trial. Snooping in broom closets and personal offices turned up nothing but cobwebs and glares. Eventually, the duo stumbled upon the strange sight of Mr. Clark, Asgore, Frisk, and Anta trying to unlock the door to the women's restroom. Before anyone could judge their odd tastes, however, something thumped the door from the inside and punched a hole clean through the wood.

Mr. Clark peeked through the hole and asked, "Your Highness, are you in here?", jumping back when a second shimmering star flew at his eye and lodged itself in the door.

"Get away from my friend!"

The alien pointed and muttered, "One 'borrowed' water cooler says they're in that bathroom."

"Asriel? Mommy and Daddy's here. Everything's fine now. Just open the door so we can come in, okay?"

The wooden door creaked open, allowing the king and queen to administer a hearty dose of fluffy hugs and soothing words to a hyperventilating and sweating prince.

"Mom...Dad...The humans...Chara...they..."

"Chara's safe. They aren't going to hurt her. Just take a deep breath, Azzy, and look around. We'll never let them get past us."

Meanwhile, the alien pulled the prosecutor aside and asked, "Mr. Clark, there can only be one reason why _you're_ here. The kids are testifying, aren't they?"

"Yes. The attempted murder case was about as open-and-shut as it could get, so I didn't need as many witnesses. This child abuse charge will be much trickier because it's very difficult to prove a chronic pattern of mistreatment. Unless the Tellers' house was being recorded 24/7, it's all too easy for Rockefeller to claim something like 'accidental injuries' and 'right to discipline.' It's unfortunate, but we're going to need to pull out all the stops to have a winning chance."

"It's pretty obvious they got spooked by all the shouting people and hysteria, and the last trial made it perfectly clear what could happen if you back a monster into a corner. Are you absolutely sure they can handle being up there?"

"The judge said he won't tolerate another episode like that, and I'll do everything I can to keep the angry mob from erupting again. They're good people, Luna, but they can lose themselves in the fires of passion just like anyone else. It's just a part of being human, or, I suppose, being alive."

With the recess coming to an end, everyone returned to their seats. Maybe it was just the prosecutor's warning about these kinds of trials, but the air in the room felt a lot thinner than it did before.

"Court is now back in session. We shall now address the two charges of child abuse brought up against Mr. and Mrs. Teller. However, due to the fact that the victims have already spent a considerable amount of time with adoptive parents, this trial will also settle the matter of legal guardianship. The members of the jury shall decide who will retain custody of the children in addition to the guilt or innocence of the defendants. Mr. Clark, if you will, please proceed with the opening statement."

"Thank you, Your Honor. Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, the matter you are examining today may be one of the most atrocious crimes ever dragged into this courtroom. To put it simply, Mr. and Mrs. Teller have perpetuated years of physical and emotional abuse against their son, Anta, and their daughter, Chara. As we've discovered from the previous trial, Chara had escaped from the Tellers years ago and has since lived with the royal family of the Monster Kingdom. Even though she managed to save herself by finding the Dreemurrs, Chara found the courage to appear in court today and confront her assailants. As it turns out, there was still one other person whom she needed to save. Her older brother, Anta, is still trapped in the poisonous web of custody she knew all too well. Today, ladies and gentlemen, you have the power to help her finally cut down that web. You can put an end to years of pain and suffering for good, and you can give these two children the life they deserve."

"As a testament to that poisonous web, I'd like to submit the two children's medical records into evidence."

"Playing to their hearts, are we?"

The voice popping into his ear made Mr. Clark nearly fall off his chair. Luna had taken a liking to sitting behind the prosecutor's bench, somehow finding the time to pull up a seat next to Clark's. Meanwhile, the jury winced as a thick stack of papers slammed down onto the metal cart. Just a few more pages, and it would have passed for a medical school's textbook.

"This would certainly indicate a pattern of harm befalling Chara and Anta, but some information appears to be missing."

"That's right, Your Honor. After being appalled at the fact that most of the injuries were poorly treated if not neglected outright, the doctors had no problems reconstructing most of what happened to each child. They lacked the time needed to determine when each event happened or conclusively diagnose these strange black marks on their arms. Regarding those, the theory they put forward identified the marks as an unusual type of burn. But, only witness testimony can shed light on the missing facts, so the prosecution calls Mr. and Mrs. Teller to the stand."

Chara's biological parents stood up, but Rockefeller whispered something that made them quickly sit back down.

"We...refuse to testify."

The words were soft-spoken, but carried enough bite to put a certain monster two steps from drawing a weapon.

"You cowards! What do you mean you 'refuse to testify?' We deserve to know the truth after all this time, and you're not going to hide it anymore."

* * *

Mr. Teller HP: 72/72

Mrs. Teller HP: 72/72

*Crimson SOULs.

* * *

In full view of the court, Luna leaped out of his seat and landed in front of the defense's bench.

"So the big bad shotgun lady suddenly clams up when everyone's looking at her. The police won't be coming to save you anymore. Tell us exactly what you did to those kids or I'll carve the words out of you!"

"Slow down there, Luna."

"But Mr. Clark, didn't you want their testimony?"

The prosecutor tugged his self-appointed assistant back to the second seat behind the prosecutor's bench and said to the court, "As you can all understand, this monster is a bit...sensitive to family issues. I apologize for my colleague's 'enthusiasm,' but it's quite obvious how important the outcome of this case is to the monsters."

Then, he turned and whispered, "As much as I hate to say this, the Tellers have the right to avoid incriminating themselves, even if it means keeping their mouths shut for the entire trial. My guess is that Rockefeller knows the jury isn't going to be too pleased anything suspected child abusers have to say, so they're trying their best to hold on to their credibility. But please, this isn't an interrogation. No more stunts. The jury's wary of all of you as it is and we don't need to rattle them any further."

Clack.

"If the prosecution has gotten its act together, I believe it had a contingency plan prepared."

"Yes, Your Honor. If her parents have chosen to remain silent, then the prosecution has no choice but to call Chara herself to the stand."

The child climbed up onto the stand and swore to tell the truth and every last detail it encompassed.

"Witness, please state your name for the record."

"My name is Chara."

"Before I begin with the questioning, I would like the court to acknowledge the delicacy of this situation. No matter what the verdict is, it doesn't change the fact that this witness is not only a minor, but has suffered from extreme physical and mental trauma. Just being here is difficult for her and we haven't even touched upon her memories yet. Since asking Chara to explain each and every incident in the medical records would be incredibly cruel, I will instead focus on the most obvious detail, the one that I believe wholly embodies the relationship between Chara and her biological parents."

"I see. The court asks that both the prosecution and the defense refrain from subjecting the witness to unnecessary discomfort. Mr. Clark, you may now begin the examination."

Someone in the back of the room switched on an overhead projector, displaying a photograph of Chara's arms onto a wheeled-in canvas.

"Prosecution's Exhibit A. These are the anomalous markings the doctors were unable to identify. However, there are certain conclusions we may still draw without knowing their exact cause. It's unlikely an accident like touching a hot stove would lead to this shape and area of effect, so it's only appropriate to conclude that someone made this happen purposefully. As for who that someone is..."

"Chara. When Mommy and Daddy said you did something wrong, what did they do?"

"Don't call them that."

"My bad. Now, to rephrase the question: Did the Tellers ever hit you and your brother as a form of punishment?"

"They...said it was normal for parents to discipline their children from time to time. I thought all families were like this, but..."

Chara's voice trailed off. She knew what she wanted to say, but it felt nice to have the prosecutor say it for her.

"Then you ran away and met a family who treated you as a real family should. A family who repaid the Tellers' brutality twofold with gentleness. You discovered, ironically enough, how _inhumane_ your human parents were compared to your adoptive parents."

The child nodded and sniffled.

"Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, I hardly think I need to explain the whirlwind of emotions Chara went through. After years of living in fear of the Tellers' 'right to discipline' gone horribly wrong, it was clearly a great shock for her to meet two parents who treated her with unconditional kindness; who sacrificed everything they had to keep her safe whenever violence broke out and believed in her even during the Underground's darkest hours."

* * *

 _Strolling through Waterfall on his way to Snowdin, Asgore heard muffled sobs echoing off the cave walls. He followed the sound and found Chara crying quietly by a river and a few blue flowers._

 _"Chara? What's wrong?"_

 _"It's not fair! Why do we have to be stuck down here like this? What if we never figure out how to destroy the barrier? What if you and Mom and Asriel and everyone else never get to go back to the surface again? What if—"_

 _"Shh...do not worry, my child. We are all working on this together and we will to find a way out somehow. But you have to stay determined, Chara. You are the hopes and dreams of humans and monsters."_

 _A few more minutes passed, father and daughter locked in warm embrace and surrounded by soothing, trickling water._

* * *

"So who's responsible? Given the facts of the previous trial, it would be unthinkable, nay, _impossible_ for Chara's fireball-using adoptive parents to cause such a serious 'burn'. Similarly, none of the other monsters would dare commit such an atrocity when everyone trapped underground needed unwavering solidarity just to keep pressing on with their lives. Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, I feel no regret in claiming that Mr. and Mrs. Teller were the ones responsible for all, if not most of the incidents described in this medical record. It was their twisted notions about parenthood and their cruel actions which drove their daughter into the arms of the monsters, and it's time for them to pay for their crimes."

Mr. Clark's conclusion sent the courtroom straight past whispers and murmurs and directly into an uproar. The atmosphere was such that several bailiffs positioned themselves around the defendants for their protection. Meanwhile, Chara jumped off the stand, ran into her brother's arms, and finally broke down into tears.

"Prosecutor, I agreed to stay in my seat for the rest of the proceedings, but I have no intention of guaranteeing the same for my friends. You'd better find a fire extinguisher if the rest of the audience doesn't beat them to the beat-down."

Clack.

"Order! Order! As this trial now stands, it would seem that nobody other than Chara's own parents could have caused and then ignored those injuries. For the sake of the Tellers' safety, I would like to call these proceedings to an expedient close, but I can't help but notice that the defense has been unusually quiet thus far. Does the defense have any final remarks it would like to offer?"

"Your Honor, the defense has been mulling over a...theory about Chara's medical record. At first, I thought it was impossible, so I refrained from presenting it to the court. But now, after the prosecution has shed light on some of the facts, I believe my theory is highly plausible."

"Very well then. Present your explanation at once."

"Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, I believe that in chasing the culprit responsible for Chara's injuries, we have all overlooked a crucial detail about Chara herself. While what I am about to claim may seem...unbelievable, I ask that the jury at least consider the reasoning behind this possibility."

"The defense believes that Chara is _mentally unstable_ , if not suicidal outright. The only culprit responsible for Chara's injuries...is _herself_."

Everyone fell utterly silent. Even the reporters stopped whispering into their cameras and sat staring at Mrs. Rockefeller, mouths agape and microphones lowered.

"Rockefeller! Are you sure you're not the one who's lost your mind? Are you seriously claiming that those injuries were all self-inflicted?"

"I know it sounds far-fetched, but I'd like to call a witness I believe will give this claim a leg to stand on. The defense hereby calls Toriel and Asgore Dreemurr to testify."

As usual, the two of them made their way to the stand and swore to tell nothing but the truth. As usual, they gave their names and their jobs as rulers of the Monster Kingdom.

"Please describe Chara on the day she first arrived at your doorstep."

* * *

Human Child 99 AT 15 DF HP: 32/44

*LV 7.

*We have to help her.

* * *

"She was tired, afraid, and looked beaten-down. At first we thought she had just run away from some sort of fight back in the humans' village, so we set her down on a bed and tended to her injuries. It was quite a shock when she sat up and asked us if she could live with us."

* * *

 _"Please. My mom and dad are gone and I have no one else to go to."_

* * *

"Mrs. Rockefeller, all you've done so far is force open an old wound and rip out a hunk of nostalgia. Your Honor, this line of reasoning has all been a waste of time and I request that the trial be over immediately. If you recall, this court agreed earlier to keep the discomfort to Chara at a minimum."

The judge nodded and raised his gavel in the air, only to be interrupted by a "Wait!" from the defense's bench.

"Your Honor, I just have one last question for this witness. The defense will rest without further complaint if this one turns up no new information, but please give me one more chance."

"Fine, Mrs. Rockefeller, but if you fail, this trial will end immediately and I will send the jury to deliberate. I don't appreciate anyone traumatizing children just for the sake of an acquittal."

"Did Chara have anything with her when she arrived at your home?"

Mr. Clark, Toriel, Asgore, and the alien winced. It should have been an insignificant detail compared to everything else. No detective would have thought to investigate something as meaningless as what a child had in her pockets on a certain day, and no prosecutor would have thought to prepare a defense against one little detail. But the witnesses remembered it all too clearly and the court was waiting.

"She had...a knife in her hand."

"A knife, ladies and gentlemen. This child, who couldn't have been more than six or seven years old at the time, had a knife with her."

Gasps. Murmurs. The reporters kept their eyes glued to the witness stand instead of giving their usual commentary to the cameras.

"Obviously, no ordinary child would ever carry a knife everywhere they went, and in fact, one of the bailiffs told me that Chara was found with that same knife when she passed through the metal detector at the beginning of the day. The defense has two explanations for why Chara would carry that knife with her, and both of them are difficult to stomach."

"As much as I hate to make this claim, Number One explains all of the parts of the medical report that involve scars. Out of respect for everyone in the courtroom, I will try to explain what I mean as gently as I can."

 _"Suffering from unbearable mental anguish, Chara sought relief in any way she could."_

The murmurs erupted into clamoring again. Several of the monsters looked as if they had just been punched in the gut.

"You're as insane as you're making our daughter out to be. There's just no way."

"I'm sorry, witness, but Number Two...is much worse. We as a society are only starting to accept monsterkind today, so it stands to reason that years ago, the human village was incredibly distrusting of its monster neighbors. The townsfolk likely circulated rumors about terrible things the monsters did, probably formed armed guards against unwanted visitors, and definitely warned their children never to stray near the monsters' mountain. I'm not trying to defame monsters of any time and age by saying these things, but there is a strong possibility that this was the prevailing atmosphere in the village after the Human-Monster War."

Mr. Clark sprung from his seat. He had no worries about how well he'd built his case against the Tellers, but no good could come from giving the defense an opportunity to develop a full-fledged counterargument of any level of outlandishness.

"Objection. This court can do without a history lesson and would much prefer new information related to this case."

"Keep your shirt on, prosecutor, and consider this. Why would a young child walk knife-in-hand into a place she's been told all her life was dangerous?"

Mr. Clark folded his arms.

"Maybe Chara just fled from a fight with the Tellers and grabbed the nearest weapon without thinking. After all, the Dreemurrs' testimony revealed that she was indeed injured when they found her."

"Not quite, Mr. Clark. If that was the case, Chara would sooner run to the doctor or the town sheriff than to a bunch of mysterious monsters."

"Then the townsfolk must have been sympathetic to the Tellers. Chara knew she couldn't depend on her neighbors for help, so she went looking in the monsters' country out of desperation."

"That doesn't make sense either. If Chara wanted the monsters' help, she wouldn't have brought that knife with her. She would have disposed of it in order to appear as nonthreatening to the monsters as possible."

"Then what?"

"I submit to you that Chara's visit to the monsters' home was for the unhappiest of all possible reasons; in other words, a _suicide attempt_. Waving a knife in her hand, Chara entered the Underground in an attempt to provoke a monster into attacking her. As we've learned from the previous trial, magical attacks can reach lethal strength if the monster is placed in a life-threatening situation. Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, I'm sure you would fear for your life if some stranger approached you with a knife in their hand, and that goes at least triple for the monsters."

"No! That isn't our Chara! Our daughter would never hurt anyone, and that includes herself!"

The prosecutor waved his hands around, as exasperated as if an asteroid just smashed his car.

"There's a gaping hole in your logic, Rockefeller, and that's the fact that Chara just testified a few minutes ago! How could you possibly claim that Chara is suicidal when she was fit to take the stand? Furthermore, the Dreemurrs mentioned no such incident of a monster preemptively attacking Chara."

"That's just it, Clark. It was an attempt and nothing more. Chara, in a state of extreme mental anguish, must have been shocked when every single monster she bumped into refused to harm her. The monsters' show of unconditional acceptance must have been enough to calm Chara from her loss of mind, and somehow, she must have recovered enough under their care to take the stand today. However, this moment of warm fuzziness has no bearing on her previous mental condition, and if I can show that her condition persisted beyond that day, then I'd say my claim suddenly becomes much more than just a theory."

Someone jumped out of his seat and slammed a fist onto the railing in front of the benches.

"You liar! My best friend would never think of doing such terrible things!"

"Wouldn't she, Your Highness? As a matter of fact, the defense was actually planning to call Prince Asriel Dreemurr to the stand."

"Objection! What could you possibly want with Asriel?"

Mr. Clark tapped the alien on the shoulder and added, "Luna, that isn't a legitimate reason to give an objection. I appreciate that you didn't invade Rockefeller's bench this time, but please leave the legal wrangling to me."

"Nevertheless, Your Honor, my colleague has raised an interesting point. It's true that the prince has known Chara for several years, but what relation does that have with the case at hand?"

"Mr. Clark, you and I both know that kids are geniuses when it comes to hiding things from their parents. I believe Chara's 'best friend' can offer an insight into her mental state that not even the king and queen are aware of."

"I see. The court will allow this witness to take the stand, if only for the sake of learning all of the facts behind this mess of a trial."

One adorable goat child took his parents' place on the witness stand.

"Please state your name and your relationship to Chara."

"My name is Asriel Dreemurr. I am Chara's brother and best friend. And if you think you're going to make me say mean things about Chara, you're wasting your time."

"What was Chara like during her time underground? Did she seem happy? Sad? Afraid? Angry?"

"Chara might have been jumpy when she first showed up, but after a week or so, she looked like a miner who could finally breathe fresh air again. She smiled a lot and always wanted to play with me."

"All we've learned so far, Rockefeller, is that these two kids, _surprisingly enough_ , acted exactly like kids. Where exactly is this alleged mental patient you keep speculating about? Or are you now going to claim that they were pretending to be depressed as a part of their games?"

"Did Chara ever get hurt with no clear explanation why?"

"Humans and Monsters gets a little rough, and sometimes, I'd get a little too careless with my magic. But it was never anything serious—just the occasional bump or scrape that a healing spell could fix up easily."

"Was there any incident that stood out from the rest?"

Mr. Clark raised a hand to shush Mrs. Rockefeller and produced a folder with the other.

"I think I see where you're going with this, so I'd like to submit my colleague's case file detailing the events of the day when Chara contracted buttercup poisoning. Don't think I'm starting to buy into your claim, Rockefeller; I'm just trying to spare two kids from talking about the day they almost died."

"You were going to make me talk about _that_?"

As one would expect, the prince held a sizable advantage in winning the hearts and souls of the courtroom over the lawyer willing to defend suspected child abusers. When the jury's murmurs picked up again, Asriel heard a clear "Shame on that woman!" and grinned.

Clack.

"Order! You're on thin ice, defense. I should hope for the Tellers' sake that you see a meaningful outcome come out of your questioning soon."

"I'm almost there, Your Honor. Skipping over some difficult details...Witness, isn't it possible that your friend might have poisoned herself on purpose?"

"No! How could you say that about Chara?"

"We know for a fact that Chara had lived her whole life in the human village with the Tellers. It's also safe to conclude that since the two places were within walking distance of each other, buttercups would have flourished in both places. I find it incredibly hard to believe that every single adult—human, monster, or otherwise—simply forgot to warn her not to eat a common poisonous plant."

The witness reached for his friend with a pleading look, shouting, "Chara! Tell me she's wrong! Please!"

Chara reached back, shouting, "Azzy, I—"

"Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, there is simply no conceivable chance that Chara's poisoning was accidental. She was a victim not of abuse, but of her own psychological state. We were wrong to lunge at the Tellers like tigers at fresh meat; in a way, they were victims, too, of the extraordinary challenge of caring for their ailing child. Can we not forgive the Tellers for any lapses in judgement they may have had given that they were committing every ounce of energy toward Chara's unique needs?"

Mr. Clark raised a finger into the air to object but found himself staring indignantly at the jury instead. In the silence, Chara's brother burst out of his seat and dashed to the witness stand, nearly knocking Asriel off the chair with a "Move over, Fluffy."

"Now wait just a minute here. You're all picking on my little sister when everyone seems to have forgotten that there were two charges of abuse! Two! I'm a victim, so why don't I get to testify?!"

"Good heavens! Mister, um, Antagonist, please return to your seat and refrain from storming the witness's stand unless you are called up."

"Actually, Your Honor, the prosecution has no objections against Anta testifying. I'd say that if the Tellers are guilty of hurting Anta, they're guilty of hurting his sister too."

"The defense has no objections either. Mr. Clark doesn't seem to be able to conclusively disprove my theory, so we'll need to break the deadlock somehow. Likewise, I agree with the prosecution that if the Tellers aren't doubly guilty of abuse, then they're not guilty of either count."

"It _would_ be quite strange for abusive parents to toss everything at one child while leaving the other completely untouched. This should be an interesting proposition you two have created for the jury. But before we proceed, I believe the court should first begin by reviewing Anta's medical records. Prince Dreemurr, you may step down from the stand."

Asriel went straight to a flustered Chara and told her, "You don't have to tell me if those things the mean lady said were true. Maybe it's best if you're the only one who knows, but I'm here for you no matter what. We all care about you, and we'll always listen if you ever want to talk about something."

Mrs. Rockefeller finished poring over the medical records and announced, "Your Honor, it seems that Anta's file is just as strange as his sister's counterpart, but for the opposite reason."

"I agree. While Chara's is staggeringly lengthy and varied, Anta's describes only a series of cuts and scars on his arm. The doctors concluded that some of them were older than others, but just like Chara's record, they couldn't pinpoint any exact dates. A re-examination has discovered a similar pattern of unusual black markings, but Anta's appear much more faded than Chara's."

Luna whispered something into the prosecutor's ear. Mr. Clark straightened himself and began, "I find it difficult to imagine how all those injuries got there in one fell swoop, and in fact, my colleague believes he can explain exactly how Anta racked up those scars over time while negating the possibility of an accident."

"Objection! That goat isn't a lawyer!"

'That goat' folded his arms and glared at Rockefeller, replying, "I'm an investigator. Here I am investigating what happened to the witness and otherwise fulfilling my job description to the letter. Your Honor, if the defense wants Mr. Clark to do the questioning, he's going to ask exactly what I would have asked."

"Prosecutor, is this true?"

"Yes. This is a theory we've been discussing for quite some time."

"Then I'll allow it. The precedent for a monster bar association must begin somewhere. Mr. Clark, you will supervise."

"Good. Witness, I'd like you to think back when we were still at the Tellers' residence yesterday. Do you remember when Frisk asked you for your name?"

Anta nodded.

"Shortly after that, my assistant overheard a very interesting comment you made about the Tellers. The defendants were, in your words, 'two people who spent every waking moment wasted and every other moment passed-out drunk.'"

The goat monster sniffed himself and thought, "The smell...I've scrubbed and I still don't think it's all come out..."

Mr. Clark slid a shiny photograph onto the evidence table and explained, "The forensics team did discover several open bottles of liquor during their search of the Tellers' household."

"So two adults like to unwind after work with a bottle or two. Goat-lawyer, I'm not sure if you're aware of this, but alcohol is a rather common pastime among Earth humans. The defendants' questionable recreational activities have absolutely nothing to do with the charges of abuse. If you're going to waste this court's time by suggesting insubstantial theories, then maybe we should have left the lawyering to someone competent."

"But the Tellers' choice of 'recreational activity' gives us an impression of their behavior around their children, doesn't it? Anyone can see that maybe the Tellers should have left the bottles in a high cabinet and the parenting to 'someone competent.' With that kind of reckless behavior, their claim to legal guardianship looks a little tipsy now, wouldn't you agree?"

Luna smirked and gave a subtle thumbs-up and Rockefeller clenched a wad of paper in her hand.

"But that's not all. Anta, do you remember any specific events that drastically altered the Tellers' behavior with alcohol?"

"There's only one thing I can think of. I can't remember if they actually started drinking more, but there were definitely more open bottles around soon after Chara was born."

"One moment, prosecutor. The witness would have been a very, _very_ young boy at the time of the event he's describing. Can the court honestly trust the reliability of his memory?"

"Your Honor, I think we can trust a child's ability to count correctly, and with the Tellers remaining silent, we don't have much else to draw from. In any event, Anta has shown us that Chara was likely some sort of stressor that led to alcohol complications. Unfortunately, there's only one possibility which seems to make sense."

"The stressor was Chara's mental illness. Positively exhausted from their child's additional needs, the Tellers found a coping mechanism, albeit an unhealthy one. In other words, this new information validates the defense's previous claim of self-inflicted injury!"

"No, Rockefeller. I'm afraid if that was true, Anta wouldn't have noticed the behavioral shift until several years after Chara's birth, after any symptoms had a chance to appear. As for the real reason why Chara was a stressor..."

The alien's face darkened. Even though he wasn't talking at the moment, it was still his theory being presented with all the hills and tar pits he anticipated. He turned his head and mouthed a gentle "I'm sorry" to Chara.

" _Chara was an unwanted child."_

Despite the pain in the courtroom, there were no tears. Despite the harshness of the words, there were no angry voices accusing the prosecution of being wrong. There was only shock and unwavering eye contact between parent and child tearing at the bench from every angle. Luna was sure Chara was shouting something at the Tellers, yet everything was muffled and indistinct. The only thing he could hear was Clark's voice cautiously slogging through the swamp ahead.

"For some reason only the Tellers themselves know, they couldn't accept Anta's sister as part of their family. They turned to drinking as a futile attempt to escape from their reality, but no amount of liquor could have spirited Chara away into the night. When the Tellers finally realized that Chara was here to stay, they turned on her. Perhaps unconsciously, they began to view her as an enemy; a cause of all of their problems that could be dealt with."

Luna took a deep breath. Listening to and advancing the argument to the end felt like fighting a mountain for every last bit of thin air.

"This...this is the sole reason why the medical records are so lopsided. Chara, the target of the Tellers' aggression, naturally took the lion's share of the abuse while Anta was, ironically enough, spared from the worst. We know from Anta's testimony that the Tellers drank enough to knock themselves up and down and out cold and everything in between. Now...what would someone in a drunken rage do when they saw someone they didn't like?"

"They'd go swinging whatever they were holding at the time, I suppose. I don't believe a drunk would place much thought into choosing a specific weapon to confront someone with."

"Exactly, Your Honor. The Tellers must have swung a bottle at Chara at some point. With so many incidents contained in that file, at least one of them must describe lacerations from glass. Lacerations which would be severe enough to need stitches and leave scars. Now, where have we seen this before?"

Rockefeller continued angrily mangling the wad of paper in her hand, mumbling, "No...you can't possibly mean..."

"Anta...loved his little sister. There's no denying that. He couldn't bear to see Chara in pain over and over again. And so, he did what any big brother would do."

The prosecutor's bench shot an intense, burning look at Anta.

"Witness! You tried to protect Chara from a nasty blow from the bottle on several occasions, didn't you? Each time you got between the defendants and Chara, the bottle shattered across your arm and left those scars, didn't it? So the Tellers are doubly guilty after all!"

And with that finishing statement, the goat consultant buried himself in his seat and clutched his head until the courtroom stopped spinning.

(Come on, Teller...tell me I'm wrong. Tell me you didn't throw this child away; that I don't know what I'm saying and Chara truly means something to you...)

But they refused to testify. Rockefeller looked far from defeated, lips forming a curious smile and light bulb fizzing to life.

"While the prosecution has raised an...interesting theory, the defense has discovered a flaw in its central premise. I can prove that Chara was not an 'unwanted child' as the prosecution claims, and without that, the 'broken bottle' theory falls to pieces."

"I agree. The prosecution's theory seems to follow logically from the circumstantial evidence, but it all rests upon whether Chara was indeed unwanted. With the defendants choosing not to testify, it will be difficult to verify this fact."

Rockefeller stepped up to the witness stand, pausing midway to exchange cold glances with the goat and the lawyer.

"Witness, Mount Ebott is an isolated place, obscured from the common knowledge of most humans. Yes, there are a few maps and academic texts describing the location of the Monster Kingdom, but it isn't exactly a tropical island paradise you can just buy a plane ticket to. I think the court would be very interested to hear how you learned about Chara's whereabouts and how you were able to make the trip by yourself."

"It all started when I turned on the news and saw Chara at Switzerland with the UEG's top military leaders. The monsters were there too, so I knew Chara must have been living with them for all that time. All it took then was research and a couple dozen cans of soda."

"That sounds like it was a lot of information to put together, especially for a child."

"I agree, Your Honor. Even though Anta strikes me as resourceful and quite capable of hunkering down in a library all day, it still seems improbable for him to navigate all the way to Mount Ebott. Witness, you had help with your long journey, didn't you?"

"Yes. Mom and Dad were watching the news with me, and they were just as surprised to see Chara as I was. They said they wanted their daughter back, so they asked me to go talk to Chara for them. They even paid for the tickets and transfers and everything."

"And there we have it: The proof which makes any notion of Chara being an unwanted child ridiculous. If the Tellers truly held animosity against their daughter, they would have been satisfied to hear about her being a literal distant memory."

"Wait a minute. Then why didn't the Tellers go to Mount Ebott? If they truly cared about Chara, they would have moved heaven and earth just to see her face again for themselves. Instead, they sent their son alone into a strange land as some sort of bizarre proxy agent."

"I understand your concern, Clark, but you must remember that the Tellers were adult descendants of the original population of humans to seal the monsters underground. If they actually stepped foot near the monsters' home, the monsters had every right to attack them on sight. Sending Anta, their much less intimidating son, was the only way for them to establish contact without risking another war. In any event, the fact remains that the Tellers made their best attempt to see Chara again. Perhaps the defendants had a strange way of showing it, but they missed her. They went to great lengths just for a chance at making their family whole again. Without the monsters at Chara's side, it's entirely possible that Chara could have forgiven them."

"Well, Mr. Clark? Do you honestly think that the Tellers would victimize their one and only shot at reuniting with their daughter?"

More whispering and murmuring. This time, the alien noticed an especially spirited cascade of voices, as though the jury had fractured into opposing factions. Oddly enough, he felt a little relieved, too.

"But Anta's trip happened just a few days ago! With the medical record still here, there's no denying that several _somethings_ had happened to him. No matter how much the Tellers may have changed, the fact still stands that both Chara and Anta were repeatedly hurt and that the Tellers are the only reasonable suspects!"

"That's only if there was ever a suspect to begin with! I've already shown how it could be possible for both children to be responsible for their own injuries."

"And how exactly did Anta scar himself if the Tellers didn't do it?"

"Freak accident, perhaps? We've all seen firsthand just how clever this kid can be. Maybe while most kids were falling off bicycles and crashing into half-pipes, he's gone and built himself a secret underground lab full of sensitive equipment and dangerous tools."

"This is insanity! How are you possibly claiming that one of these kids attempted suicide by murder flower and that the other was some kind of mad scientist?"

"Do you have a better theory? One doesn't fall apart when I start prodding it with the facts?"

"Anything would be better than claiming those two kids hurt themselves over and over again!"

The monsters felt confused. It sounded as if the lawyers' arguments had devolved into petty bickering. With the trial finally in its final stages, both prosecution and defense were thoroughly exhausted. All the reporters had run out of comments to make to the cameras, and all of the monsters were itching for the verdict.

Clack.

"With all the witnesses having had a chance to testify, I see no reason to further prolong this trial. Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, you may now proceed to deliberations."

Twelve people left the courtroom and returned after a few increasingly awkward hours between prosecutor and defense and Dreemurrs and Tellers. One of them rose and began reading, "Regarding the charge of attempted murder, we find the accused...guilty. We are not convinced that the accused had a legitimate claim to self-defense."

"Regarding the charges of child abuse, we find the accused...not guilty. There are simply too many possibilities for us to condemn the accused beyond a reasonable doubt."

"Finally, with regards to the legal guardianship of Chara and Anta, we have chosen to award custody to the Dreemurrs. It was an incredibly difficult decision that would tear apart a family no matter which side received our blessing, but we are convinced that the two children would live happier with the monsters."

Any remaining reporters furiously scribbled the headline in their notepads, landmark decision permanently sealed in precedent for all time.

"Very well then. Defendants, please rise for sentencing."

Mr. and Mrs. Teller stood up.

Clairine Teller, you have no prior convictions; therefore, some leniency is in order. The minimum sentence for attempted murder is five years."

"Charles Teller, you were acquitted of all charges, so you are free to go."

Chara's biological mother fainted in her husband's trembling arms. Some of the bailiffs approached Mr. Teller, but he kept backing away from them.

"What? You can't just haul my wife off to prison! I...I won't let you! You'll have to take me too!"

The bailiffs wrenched Mrs. Teller away, leaving the husband to chase them and try to push his way past the guards.

"Give it up, Teller. It's over."

"You! This is all your fault!"

Chara's father swung a right hook at Luna's head, clocking him right in the jaw. The surprise blow left him doubled over, paw wiping a streak of blood from the corner of his mouth. He looked up suddenly and telekinetically threw Mr. Teller into the railing.

"Mr. Teller! You did not just commit assault in my courtroom! I'll hold you in contempt of court for this!"

"Your Honor, what's the penalty for contempt of court?"

"A fine. Perhaps a jail sentence, but no more than a weekend."

"And what about assault?"

"A few years. Since you're a detective, I'd guess around five or six."

Mr. Teller picked himself up off the floor, propped himself up with the railing, and dazedly mumbled, "Heh...I plead guilty, Your Honor. Go ahead and send me to prison. Send me to be with my dear wife."

The judge raised his gavel, but Luna stopped him and said, "Your Honor, I've had...a change of heart about the defendant. I forgive him for his lapse in judgement. Let's give him a second chance and pretend that little scuffle never happened."

"But you're bleeding! Are you sure you don't want to move forward with the charges?"

"I insist, your Honor. Nothing to worry about here. Monsters just don't hold up as well against physical attacks as their magical powers would suggest; that's all."

"Fair enough. Bailiffs, take Mr. Teller away while we prepare the proceedings for his contempt charge. There will be no additional charge levied for assault."

Even though most people would breathe a sigh of relief after being pardoned like that, something came unhinged in Mr. Teller's mind. He was practically frothing at the mouth just as Mrs. Teller was during the midnight standoff.

"No! NO! You weak, conniving monster! My wife! I...I'll kill you for this! Let me at him, you stupid pigs!"

"The only time you've spoken up this entire trial, and it's for your wife's sake instead of your little daughter's. I was right all along, wasn't I? You never cared, did you?"

Mr. Teller shouted a series of unpleasantries and tried to break free of the bailiffs, but they held on tightly and dragged him toward the door.

(Get out of here. And if I see you anywhere near Chara again, I'll force-feed you into a black hole.)

"Well...if it wasn't obvious already: Mr. and Mrs. Dreemurr, you are free to go with Chara and Anta. With that, court is now adjourned."


	31. Respite

Luna HP: 257,000

*Can't take a punch, apparently.

* * *

Asriel took off sprinting towards the door Mr. Teller was unceremoniously hauled through, only to be scooped up in his mother's arms and re-placed where he started.

"But, Mom! You always say I have to practice with my magic, so let me try on the bad guy! How am I supposed to grow up to be the absolute God of Hyperdeath if I don't practice?"

Chara, feeling quite a bit better after hearing the trial's outcome, snickered to herself. Toriel brushed something off the top of her son's head against his tactile protests, replying, "Asriel...you know we raised you better than that. No throwing stars, star beams, lightning bolts, blasters, swords, or anything of the sort unless you absolutely, positively have to use them to protect someone."

They casually opened the wooden door and stepped out to see the prosecutor sitting in a bench, packing papers into a briefcase. With most of the reporters making their way out of the building, what commotion there was gradually died down and faded into a serene silence. Footsteps echoed against the marble floor as the alien walked up to him and offered a handshake.

"Ah. If it isn't our special 'guests.' I'm sorry that I couldn't get Mr. Teller a more deserving sentence, but I can definitely arrange some sort of restraining order for you. I also heard about his...shameful four-knuckled portrayal of our legal system, but what did you think about your glimpse into the courts?"

"It got ugly in there on more than one occasion, but they got the job done, didn't they? Maybe the juries could be made less biased, but honestly, I'm impressed they didn't acquit against us in the first five minutes. Anyway, I think I'm the one who needs to apologize. If only I'd looked harder; logged more hours at the crime scene; done more research on the defendants...maybe we could have found the perfect piece of evidence to nail them both."

"Don't sweat it. We were up against one of the top defenders in the field. Besides, you were out of jurisdiction; it wasn't your responsibility to investigate this one. Even so, that theory involving the alcohol definitely helped decide the issue of guardianship. I'm not sure how well the monsters pay you, but you certainly have the right mind and the right heart for this. Just a little more refinement and perhaps we'll be seeing a new prosecutor roaming around these halls."

"Thanks, but there's one more apology I need to make."

Luna knelt down and stared right into Chara's eyes.

"I know I crossed a line up there. I had absolutely no right to even suggest you were an unwanted child no matter what the evidence supposedly pointed towards. It's just...I kind of lost my own head up there. There was a white-hot ember who wanted nothing other than to make them pay for what they did to you. I wanted so badly for them to burn that I pushed you into the fire long before you were ready to hear those words. I'm not sure if I was ready to hear them either; Chara, the bond between parent and child is a terrible thing to lose."

"To be honest...I don't know how I feel about them anymore. Deep down I hope there was always this little part of them who truly loved me, but it's been so long. Maybe it would be better if I just forgot about them."

The alien had no words to say. He couldn't imagine the circumstances that would leave a child willing to say goodbye like that. Another pair of footsteps echoed from behind the group; turning around, they noticed they belonged to a bespectacled woman in a formal pantsuit. Luna made perhaps the one paw motion he wanted to do the most during the entire trial and drew a smoking black sword.

"You."

"Yikes! I, um...just wanted to see how you were all doing."

"We're fine. Now what else did you want? Did some human misplace one of their farm animals? Let me guess: you are here to claim our son escaped from the herd of goats at Rolling Hills Ranch and now you're going to bring us to court over it."

"No, nothing like that. Your Highness, I wanted to know if there was any chance we could rebuild the bridges I've burned. I know that not everyone has been accepting of your return to the surface."

"'Burned?' The humans tried to tear a family apart with the very first case we took part in. That bridge has been chopped up, roasted, and washed away by the river."

"I understand if you can't forgive me, but please believe me when I promise I'm not out to persecute monsters. Everything I said and did in there was just part of my job. My clients trust me to believe in them when nobody else will. Sometimes they're murderers and psychopaths, and sometimes they're honest, good people who've stumbled upon unfortunate circumstances, but they need to know at least one person is looking out them; that they haven't been cast into the lonely abyss and abandoned."

"Did you truly believe with all of your heart that the Tellers were innocent? Did it do your conscience no harm to see them walk free from the abuse charge with your help? They were cruel. Heartless. No amount of legal duty excuses will change who they were at their very core, and if you can sleep with helping them _kidnap_ our daughter, then you're no better than they are."

"I have a daughter, too. She's about the same age as Chara and I love her more than anything in the world. She went missing a few years ago, and I...I just know she's alive, but I miss her. I watch the news for hours every night hoping somebody came forward with even the slightest bit about her whereabouts, but nobody has so far. I didn't want the Tellers to have to go through this kind of pain, so I told them I'd help them get their daughter back no matter what it took."

It was now the queen's turn to fall silent. Luna sighed, dematerialized the blade in his hands, and offered, "The M.B. would be willing to help you find your lost daughter. Human or not, you're someone who needs help and we'd be remiss if we didn't take responsibility. This might not be the right place, but could you start by telling me a little more about your missing child?"

"She always talked about how she would become an archaeologist when she grew up, and she would always carry around this pad filled with sketches of old coins and plants and other 'treasures' she discovered. I'd give anything just to see that journal again."

Luna started pacing around and scratching the back of his head, muttering, "A journal... if we can find that, we might be able to figure out where she disappeared to. Have any of you seen anything like that, by any chance?"

A series of "No's." answered him.

"Heh, didn't think it would be that easy. Mrs. Rockefeller, you're a clever person; I've no doubt you've put the pieces together by now, but monsters; well, we don't exactly all live together underneath the mountain. You've seen the spaceship this morning; where there's a spaceship there must be a space station. I'm planning to visit the M.B.'s archives after I drop the royal family off at Mount Ebott. I'll order an investigation while I'm at Station ZY-9, but you can tag along if you want. You won't need a space suit or even the least bit of astronaut training."

The lawyer nodded immediately. Business or not, it didn't take a law degree to understand that free trips to space were too valuable to decline. They made their way past the metal detectors again and to the front doors of the courtroom. The doors swung open, and they came face to face with thousands upon thousands of people swarming the streets around the marble courtroom. Some of them were screaming into bullhorns, others were thrusting picket signs madly into the air, but all of them were clearly upset about the verdict. Luna raised a paw to block some of the glare from the sunset and tried to read the writing on some of the signs.

"Human families for human children!"

(If the Tellers were ever human to begin with...)

"Monsters belong in Hell!"

(And you're just begging for an express ticket there, aren't you?)

"Bite the dust!"

(Now that's just rude.)

The bullhorns fell silent and at once, thousands of people locked eyes with the monsters they just realized were standing at the top of the stairs. The monsters stood frozen, as if they woke up to find themselves in front of a firing squad. Seconds ticked by, but nobody dared break the unusual stalemate. Not a single foot approached the opposing side, not a single hand reached into a pocket or a magical energy field, and not a single breath made the mistake of being heard.

"So...this has 'slaughterhouse' written all over the parts that don't already have 'hang from the nearest tree' scribbled on. Everyone back into the courtroom as slowly and calmly as you can. Now."

The alien nudged open the door and waved for the others to head to safety. The kids went in first, followed by their parents and then the attorney. The last to retreat into the building, Luna hastily locked the door as several rocks and a rising chorus of agitated voices thumped against the finished wood. Mrs. Rockefeller fumbled with the dial screen on her smartphone while Luna did the same with his A.I.-enhanced device.

"I'm not waiting for policemen who are just as likely to shoot us as save us. _Leviathan_ , where are you now? We need a lift out of the courtroom on the double."

"This is 'Leviathan' One. I took off the moment things started to get ugly outside, but we've been hovering exactly ten kilometers above the courthouse this whole time. We're ready to open the wormhole on our end."

One of the goat monsters snapped his fingers. Rockefeller watched, mesmerized and mouth agape, as a five-foot wide black sphere appeared out of thin air.

"What's with that face? It's a wormhole. You know, a temporary bridge between two points caused by bending space into itself?"

"A worm-what?"

"You go in and come out somewhere else. This one happens to take us directly above the courthouse and directly into _Leviathan's_ cargo bay. It won't hurt a bit, so stop with the cold feet already and let's escape before they get through the door."

Luna took the lawyer by the wrist and tugged her into the vortex. Everyone else followed suit and filed out onto the carrier ship's metallic floor. Lying around them were various parcels and glowing machines, which Rockefeller and Anta started touching despite the crew's utmost protests.

* * *

'Leviathan' Three 87 AT 125 DF

*Third in command of this spacecraft.

*It's another goat monster! They're all goat monsters! They even have adorable little tails!

*You reached out to touch one of them, causing them to jump back and self-consciously cover their backsides.

* * *

Meanwhile, the alien placed a hand on one of the crates to support himself and immediately fell over anyway. After a few moments of learning what the floor smelled like, he stood up, but felt lightheaded and needed to sit back down. Frisk couldn't exactly discern what was ailing him, but his face showed an odd mixture of chills and nausea.

"Are you all right? Do you need to lie down? Chara, get your brother to stop bothering the other fluffy monsters and help me find an ice pack or a blanket or something!"

"Frisk...how large was the biggest DT barrier you were ever able to summon?"

"Maybe the size of this spaceship. I tried making them bigger, but they didn't last for more than a few seconds and I felt like I was going to faint afterward."

"Then you understand quite a bit about the limits of magic. You and Chara were right…the medically sound choice would have been to rest up. That ten-kilometer wormhole might have been pushing it…I'm not sick as in the flu, but I'll still take that blanket if Chara found one."

Luna lay down for a brief nap on top of one of the parcels, only to be rudely jolted off by a flashing proximity alarm and siren. Lifting his face off the fuselage, he shouted, "What now?"

Outside of the carrier ship, two grey fighter jets had appeared from above the clouds and were now pursuing them closely. Two starfighters, in turn, broke off from the escort and started lining up behind their human counterparts. Just before they unleashed a deadly spray of plasma, one of the jet pilots turned around in their seat and waved.

"'L1', you won't believe this, but they seem to be trying to say hello to us. Hold your fire and tap into their communications."

Bzzzt.

" _Levi_ -...erm, 'Bigger Spaceship' to Human Aircraft: what do you want?"

"This is Foxhole Seven. The top brass over at the UNSC heard about the protests at the courthouse today. Similar protests have erupted worldwide, and they're concerned about the chance of a terrorist attack. Whether you believe it or not, we've been sent up here to keep an eye out for you."

"Eagle Two to L1, recent intelligence corroborates what they're saying. We'll downgrade from 'attack' to 'standby' for now."

The starfighter pilots acquiesced. For the last leg of the journey, two air forces who under any other conditions would be dueling for control of the blue skies opted to share them instead, flying side-by-side over oceans and mountain ranges and forests. When Mount Ebott came into view, the jet pilots gave a thumbs-up to their monster counterparts and zoomed off into the direction they arrived from. The carrier landed without a scratch, allowing the Dreemurrs to disembark while waving goodbye to the crew.

(Stay safe. This is a crazy world you've cracked your way into.)

"As for you, Rockefeller, you're going to want to look out the window for this."

The lawyer obliged and watched as the grassland began to disappear below her, smoothly transitioning into clear blue skies. Then, there was a flash of white light, and the atmosphere became an elegant black canopy dotted with twinkling little stars. Every so often, a greyish-brown asteroid flew by the spaceship, pockmarked with craters for all to see.

"And here we are, both feet planted firmly inside the universe's backyard. I'd bet views like these alone are a good enough reason to treat our friends kindly, wouldn't you agree?"

But Rockefeller was speechless. Luna turned to the pilot and wisely requested, "Fly slow. She'll get a chance to take in the sights and maybe I'll finally get to take a proper nap."


	32. Temporal

Several more asteroids floated past the window like iridescent fish in an aquarium. The crew seemed uninterested in the sights of their weekly commutes, but the lawyer reacted to each and every one with unwavering enthusiasm. However, the most interesting rock by far was a massive, spherical geode pocketed with a comparatively small number of craters. It hovered in the fabric of space, semi-smooth boundary perfectly separated from its neighbors and nearly glimmering like a diamond in the dirt. The only problem with the majestic scene was that the asteroid seemed to be growing in size.

Rockefeller grabbed Luna by the shoulders and shouted, "Are you all blind? It's getting closer! Do something or we're going to crash!"

The alien remained where he stood, completely unworried and smiling curiously. The spaceship didn't slow down in the slightest, which panicked the lawyer as the asteroid grew larger still. Just before they pancaked against the unforgiving rock, another wormhole opened and deposited them into a hanger just under the planetoid's jagged surface. When Rockefeller opened her eyes again, the carrier ship was resting in the middle of an assembly of spacecrafts; some were larger, some smaller, but all of them were decorated in the usual black-purple color scheme. Each vessel had a dedicated handful of long-eared creatures polishing its windows, plasma-welding its hull, or running around with armfuls of spare parts and checklists.

"Sorry about scaring you like that...maybe I should have warned you about the hidden entrance to ZY-9. Obviously, we can't have telescopes on Earth spotting launchpads on a supposedly barren asteroid before we were ready to introduce ourselves."

This belated information was no comfort for the lawyer, still huddled against a container and recovering from a nasty case of large rocks to the face. Luna grabbed her hand, helped her to her feet, reassured her that there was nothing to fear, and took her down _Leviathan's_ ramp. The moment they stepped onto the hangar's metallic floor, every goat monster dropped whatever they were doing and gazed cautiously at the human intruder. A few of them prepared fireballs in their raised palms, ready to defend themselves should their nervously smiling visitor turn out not to be so friendly after all.

In a language sounding like sophisticated bleating, the closest began, "Luna! We heard about that mess of a trial...nasty deal all around and we're glad to be over here, safe and sound with hot drinks, but that's a human, isn't it? Why'd you bring that bloodthirsty creature here?"

"I know they were once enemies to monsters everywhere. I'm not quite ready to trust them yet either, but we have a situation. Her daughter's gone missing, and we're going to help her. Not even our greatest enemies deserve to lie awake night after night, hoping and pleading for a spot of good news that glows dimmer with each passing day."

The wary caprines, fur color ranging from the usual snowy white to a light grey to a light golden brown, didn't say a word to Rockefeller, but nodded understandingly and returned to their daily routines.

The duo kept walking, eventually reaching the end of the hanger and into a white, cylindrical room. Electric blue light flowed through a network of translucent pipes built into the floor and walls, radiating outward from a central console like the spokes of a wheel and climbing vertically up the curved walls. In the middle of the console was a dome, whose turquoise lights glowed and started projecting a three-dimensional map of the facility when Luna waved his paw over it. One of the rooms near the top of the image had a blinking red dot corresponding to the console's current location.

"This is a freight elevator into ZY-9; um…mind the packages. While humanity believed it had trapped the last few survivors underground, we've been living fairly comfortably in an asteroid fortress millions of miles away. For the past fifty years or so, we've been watching over the Earth, researching methods to destroy the Barrier and eliminating as many threats to the peace as possible so our mountain counterparts would have the best chance of thriving in their brave new world. As of now, Rockefeller, you are one of the few humans with the privilege of knowing about our interplanetary exploits, and I trust you'll keep it that way when you return to Earth."

(Not that anyone would believe you if you claimed to see an asteroid run by monsters…)

The lawyer nodded.

"We've built ZY-9 as a series of concentric shells, so floors wrap around each other as if they were layers of an onion. For convenience's sake, we made the outermost layer the hangar, but offices are deeper down. The disk we're standing on right now is an elevator, and we _could_ honestly wormhole straight to your destination, but you looked like you were going to faint last time. Anyways, just tap the level you want to go to and it'll take you there."

The lawyer gingerly stuck her hand into the hologram and poked a ring labeled "Business Level." Immediately, the floor began to slide smoothly down its cylindrical casing, revealing more of the blue channels as the ceiling receded and the walls lengthened. Along the way down, Rockefeller spied a poster plastered on the curved wall showing a setting resembling two monsters in a doctor's office. One of them was sitting on an examination table while the other, in white robes and a stethoscope, checked the patient's pulse. At the top and bottom of the poster were words written in an unusual script.

"What do those words mean?"

"Oh, that's just one of those occupational safety notices they're required to hang up. Long story short: healing spells work well on anything they work against; heck, they'll even work across species lines, but they aren't cure-alls, so do exercise common sense during your visit here."

After another minute, the solid wall became curved glass panels offering a panoramic view of a spacious plaza. The entire floor was designed like a green park, filled with chairs, tables, benches, and a mix of Earthly and otherworldly-looking plants. Close to a hundred caprines were either eating among the garden or serving something from behind one of a dozen counters.

"This floor is the Dining Level, coming just after the hangar because nothing stirs up an appetite as much as an interstellar flight. We do grow our own food here, but the hydroponics are too far away to see from this platform. You're welcome to try some later, but don't forget that some of us have only seen Earth in the news. I hope you understand if my colleagues seem a little uneasy around you."

"What do you all usually eat? Grass? Tin cans?"

The alien pointed to one of the two pointed teeth protruding from his mouth.

"Aren't you funny. But you're a quarter right. We're omnivorous, really, but it's hard to maintain livestock in a space station. Nearly everything you'll find here is magically prepared from various vegetables and grains."

A strange image of the talking goats herding other goats popped into the lawyer's head.

"Did you say 'magically prepared'? As in cooking with fireballs?"

"Not quite. The kind of magic you've seen so far is primarily for fighting, and there's a lot more to magic than that. They have eons' worth of culinary techniques I'm not familiar with and some of them definitely involve heat, but if you used a fire _attack_ on your salad, you'd probably burn down the entire table."

Rockefeller hopped off the disk and walked to one of the counters, where she saw a chef toss a chunk of dough into the air. They snapped their fingers, and in an instant, green fires wrapped around the raw dough and transformed it into a perfectly toasted slice of bread. They caught their finished creation and handed it to the lawyer, who delicately accepted it and took a bite. Remarkably, it tasted just as grainy and earthy as she was accustomed to and even had the same texture as a slice fresh from the oven. The only difference came when she swallowed it. She felt the moist lump of dough slide down her throat, but it seemed to vanish somewhere along the way to her stomach. The food going in became a pleasant, warm sensation ebbing and flowing out towards her fingers and toes.

"I feel strange...did they put something into that bread?"

"No, it's just your gut not knowing how to react to it. One unique property of magically prepared food is that the body absorbs it and all of its nutrients almost immediately after you swallow it. It doesn't go all the way through the digestive tract, and it doesn't, um...'come out' very much either. Clearly, we didn't invent vanishing victuals millions of years in advance for when we started exploring the galaxy, but saving space on toilets and sewers is a handy side effect..."

The lawyer didn't know how to react to Luna, still giving a completely serious explanation about the grand intricacies of monster poop or lack thereof. When she finally found something to say, the alien noticed he had been rambling and walked her back to the elevator to continue the trek downward. Next, the disk stopped on a floor filled with multistory buildings connected by a multilevel web of walkways. From the grid of windows spanning each wall of every structure, Rockefeller deduced that this floor housed an apartment complex of sorts. Some of the adult monsters were conversing with one another by the railings above while the smaller ones, presumably their children, were playing below.

"As you've already guessed, this is the Habitat Level. Despite what it looks like, most of the rooms here aren't intended as permanent housing. Perhaps a family's on vacation and needs a place to stay for a week or one of the caprines who works here just wants to take a nap, but nobody ever thinks about settling down on an asteroid when there's so many worlds out there to live on."

"So how much does a room key at Hotel Intergalactic cost?"

"You're my guest. Pick a room someone isn't already using and make yourself comfortable, and then tidy up the place and show yourself out when you're done with it. You don't have to rent a key because there aren't even locks on the doors. I don't even bother with a room most of the time; instead, I just pick a comfy-looking spot and nap there. Nobody bothers me unless it's something grave enough to be bothered about."

"But aren't you concerned about burglars and thieves barging in while you're fast asleep?"

"That kind of thing just...doesn't happen. We've only ever had to capture one monster in the past hundred years, and our courts have essentially been reduced to broom closets. If you asked any of us about it, they'd confuse themselves trying to understand why anyone would ever want to harm their own brothers and sisters. Naive, isn't it? Maybe this attitude is what got the monsters in trouble with the humans to begin with..."

A society seemingly without need for lawyers certainly gave the Earth lawyer plenty to think about as she stepped back onto the disk. Meanwhile, a second goat monster followed the duo onto the platform.

* * *

Zephyr 107 AT 120 DF

*The Minister of Justice. The one who sent you after Chara to begin with.

*Wearing a cute red ribbon on one of her ears.

* * *

The alien leader practically leaped into Luna's arms. They had clearly known each other for a very, very long time.

"Well, if it isn't our most interesting field operative! What did you catch this one doing? Is she a murderer? Kidnapper? Judging by her stone-cold eyes, I'd guess she breaks people down for a living."

"No, it's not like that. Minister, this is Elena. Elena, this is Zephyr. Used to be my partner, but get a fancy title and all of a sudden, running around in the dirt isn't good enough for her anymore."

"Don't start, Luna…you're just jealous they passed over you for this position."

"Oh, please…everyone knows that 'Minister of Justice' is just a hot air balloon! You know, because it takes you up and up without actually going anywhere at all? Back me up, Rockefeller, don't they have those at the law offices?"

"I'm sure they have manners there, too; deeply sorry, madam, you're our guest and my partner is fussing over nothing that concerns you."

Zephyr gave the lawyer a hearty handshake, the warmness of which surprised her compared to the others' lukewarm reactions. Unfortunately for her, the welcome wagon started to choke on its steam the moment her name came out.

* * *

 _"Now, now, we've told you before that one bad apple doesn't ruin the basket."_

 _"But 'Z' always says that humans are vicious and can't go a day without hurting someone!"_

 _"'Z' was just telling a joke. No matter what happens, never forget that there are good humans out there too. Maybe when you grow up, you can train and become the strongest agent ever and help them stop all of the bad guys."_

* * *

"Elena, hmm? Aren't you that attorney who tried to doom two children to a life of suffering? You should know that I don't appreciate meddlers interfering with our personnel's work."

"It was a matter of duty to my clients and I couldn't just abandon them, either. Sometimes it's difficult being a defense lawyer, but there are innocent people who wind up in tough situations and protecting them is a job our society desperately needs. Please. I never wanted to hurt Chara and Anta. I never meant to offend or harm any of you, especially when you're the only ones willing to help me find my daughter..."

"We're helping her find her daughter?"

Zephyr shot a quizzical look at Luna, who scratched the back of his head and grinned nonchalantly.

"I sort of promised her I'd bring her here to open an investigation."

"Fair enough. In that case, your floor should be the next one down. Tell the receptionist that 'Z' sent you, and they'll certainly listen. Try not to cause us too many more problems, okay?"

Rockefeller gave an accepting smile, waved goodbye, and disappeared into an official-looking complex. After she walked out of sight, the minister beckoned her operative over with a wave of the claw.

"Good. Now that she's gone, I want to know the real reason you've decided to stop by. Don't misunderstand me; our little Luna will always be welcome here, but something just feels...different about you. I've done my fair share of detective work, and I know you had many other subordinates who had time to escort her here."

"I let one of the monsters perform a DNA sequencing on me, and the results were...interesting, to say the least. With a sneaking suspicion, I'm here to check the archives we keep at the core of ZY-9."

"Hmph. And here I thought you actually learned how to take a proper vacation! We've never been as proud of anyone else, you know. All the other commanders have the utmost respect for you (after they were finished being jealous of and/or defeated by a kid) and you even have a patent to your name. What did you call it? That weird scarf you wear?"

Luna was miles beyond blushing at this point, grateful that nobody else could see into this section of the elevator.

"Turns out you can, um… get some fairly stable shields from a ring-shaped focus, and, if they were going to be shooting us in the head anyway, it's better than helmets that never seem to fit right. Just remember to tie it so it loosens when pulled on."

(No, it's not tacky if I wear it every now and then. Stop judging me.)

(No, it's super tacky. But out of everyone, you probably look the least like a dork with that on.)

(Hey!)

Zephyr smiled and shrugged.

"Why don't you go back up and look for someone who thinks wearing a scarf indoors isn't flashy and maybe relax with a nice coffee while you're at it? You could use a break. Let me find the data you're searching for."

Luna snapped his fingers and nearly took a wormhole back to the Dining Level, but stopped and turned around as the half-formed vortex closed behind him.

"Sounds good, 'Z', but before I go, tell me what _you_ were searching for."

"What?"

"We both know the archives are the only level inaccessible by wormhole, and if you, clearly able to do that if you're half the telepath I am, were taking the elevator...there's only one reason why that is."

"Should have known better than to try and hide that...very well then, I'll tell you. While you were meeting the Earth monsters, did you ever hear of an 'ancient artifact'? Something small, inconspicuous, and carefully buried away?"

"Now that I think about it, there was one thing they described: an old, red, rubber ball. What about it?"

"Something about that's been bothering me too. Call it a crazy hunch, but if I know what you were searching for, the artifact is an important piece of the puzzle. I wasn't sure if you should discover the answer before I did."

The disk finally stopped descending, entire cylindrical shell retracting to reveal a grid of thousands of tall, electric blue rectangles jutting out from a pitch-black floor. Luna squinted and tried to distinguish the walls of the room from the surrounding darkness, but the 'Archives' seemed to extend infinitely in all directions. 'Z' took him by the paw and started walking him towards a distant blue tower, footsteps echoing off the unseen ground.

"We're going to want to start with records dated millions of years ago."

The duo stuck their paws into some of the columns and pulled out two tiny, similarly glowing cubes. When they tossed the objects into the veiled air, the cubes expanded into holographic pictures, inscriptions, and documents. 'Z' whipped out Luna's handheld device and jotted down notes while the alien commander simply stood dumbfounded.

"So, we were both correct after all. We need to tell the monsters about this immediately."

"And what about the artifact?"

"Those Dreemurrs have no idea what they've been inadvertently guarding for these long years and those humans have no idea what they've just opened up. I'm thinking: public conference with both of their leaders."

"Isn't it a little unsafe for you to be out and about on Earth, given recent events?"

"That's why you'll be coming with me. I'm obviously better at fighting than you, but I won't say no to having someone take hits for me."

"Now that's not fair...we were kids back then and you're three years older; those 'fights' were practically between a kitten and a tiger. Still think you can beat me today with that desk job of yours?"

"Heh, we'll see about that. Collect the lawyer from the offices and I'll meet you at the hangars."


	33. Terrestrial

Maybe it was because she had one of the largest (and only) televisions in the Underground, but Alphys frequently found her laboratory to be the venue for the king and queen's tea parties. While the floor was paved with cold green tiles, a blue carpet was tucked under the TV and laid out for the guests to rest their tired feet on. Opposite the TV was a comfortable-looking couch and a chestnut coffee table holding a teapot and several glasses of golden flower tea. The second Royal Scientist, the Royal Guard captain, the skeleton brothers, and Asriel's parents were either reclining on the sofa, leaning against its arms, or walking around the table and chatting softly. Meanwhile, two of their children were locked in a combat stance by the far wall, clearly busy with their own very loud 'recreational activity'.

"Take that! Galacta Blazing!"

Frisk rolled out of the way of the first shimmering star and swung diagonally with the toy knife, blocking the second and third stars with a red streak left in midair by the blade.

"How's that, Azzy? I'll learn a shield spell before you!"

Humans and Monsters had gotten much more interesting with Frisk around. The prince grinned, replying, "Keep dreaming—we all know you're the nice one, Chara's the cool one, and _I'm_ the strong one!"

"Really, now?"

"Chaos Saber!"

Asriel summoned a gleaming white short-sword—just as ornate as the full-fledged pair, but light and small enough for a child to wield with both paws. Of course, the blade was about as sharp as a stuffed animal, but he still managed to knock the toy knife out of Frisk's hands. Now weaponless and quickly losing their game, the human child found herself backing into a rough patch of wall, hastily filled in and pending proper reconstruction after the earlier mishap with a space goat.

"All right! Now I think I'm supposed to say...'Any last words?'"

Frisk subtly shifted her gaze away from Asriel and to a nearby wooden cabinet.

"Yeah, two: Chara! Now!"

On command, the cabinet's door flew open, revealing one crouching, grinning child in the middle of the compartment and a bunch of science doodads pushed into the back corners. Before the prince could react, the other human leaped from their perch and dive-tackled him. They wrestled and tumbled over each other for a few seconds, and when the dust settled, Chara had Asriel pinned to the ground with both hands.

"And this round goes to the humans! Whoo!"

"Okay, okay, you win! Geez, I can't catch a break anymore with two of you around."

Chara wrapped up her mini-victory dance on top of her brother, only to notice that all the tea-drinking adults were staring at the two of them.

"Chara! What have I told you about roughhousing in others' homes? Get off your brother at once!"

"Do not worry, Tori, it is just a harmless little game. Do you remember how we used to play when we were that young? I still have the burn mark on my rear end to prove it, too."

The queen smiled and hid a reminiscent snicker. Meanwhile, the king picked up his daughter and gently held her in his lap, jokingly asking, "I think a winner deserves a special, sweetened iced tea, wouldn't you agree?"

Chara reached out for a glass and took a long, refreshing sip. Her two accomplices rapidly joined her at the table and enjoyed drinks of their own.

"Everyone's had something to drink now, so it's time to tell us what everyone's been dying to hear about, your Highness. We were all watching it on the news, but how did it feel to stand in that courtroom and have a law fight with the humans? Was it fun? Did you get to punch that lady in her lying face?"

"N-now Undyne, you heard what happened to that Mr. Teller—punching people in court will get you in all kinds of trouble."

"Trouble? Who cares about trouble? They went after our friends; if anything, they're the ones who are gonna end up in trouble!"

"That lawyer did tell us it was those officials' jobs to act impassively toward everyone. To think, she was only motivated further by the disappearance of her daughter when we could hardly even consider losing our Chara."

"Right-o! I'll still believe in her, and I hope she finds her daughter soon. When you have a duty, you always do it as best as you can."

Papyrus gave his brother a subtle glare.

"hey papy, what're you looking at me like that for?"

"Sans! You said you would clean out the Electricity Maze Puzzle today! Well, technically, you said 'tomorrow' yesterday, but it's already late and you still haven't started!"

"sorry papy; i'm...currently on a mandatory tea break."

"Sans...!"

"watt? this can't possibly be...shocking to you at this point."

Papyrus grabbed his head in frustration. If steam could come out of the ears the skeleton didn't have, Asgore could toss his tea kettle into the Dump.

"Papyrus, if something Hertz, Mom could take a look at it for you."

"Not you too!"

That was the threshold; peals of laughter spilled out of the lab and over the surrounding volcanic lakes. Even Papyrus chuckled a little, distaste of puns overruled by the good times.

"Speaking of things hurting, does anybody know how medium-sized Asgore is doing?"

"Oh, him? He insisted that he felt fine, but he looked rather unwell during the ride home. I know their medicine is leaps and bounds ahead of ours and it's not really our place to worry about him, but something about him...I just can't help it sometimes."

"I'm sure he's okay, sire. He's got a good sturdy SOUL, both quantitatively and qualitatively."

"Yeah! He can't die on me when he still owes me a rematch!"

Undyne cracked her knuckles while Sans flashed a bony smile and shook his head.

"heh, i don't think he's looking forward to a rematch against me though."

"That's right...you two did a real number on each other the first time you met. Sans...is there something about him you want to get off your, um...rib-cage?"

"tori, we just got off on the wrong foot is all. it's like cats and dogs, only here it's skeletons and sword-goats."

"But not even cats and dogs go so far as to tear each other's hearts out the second they meet each other. Sans, you know that you can always come talk to us if you have a problem with anything. I'm not only saying this as a queen, but as your friend. Now, are you sure there's no ill will between you two?"

Toriel wasn't buying the skeleton's answer for a second; with a long, quiet stare, she made sure he knew so too.

"look, i'm not sure how i feel about him, okay? papy's been telling me all about him ever since he made it to the first puzzle in snowdin, how he's almost half as cool as him and a nice guy at heart and looking out for the kids, too."

"He even got Mettaton to pay for tiny Asgore's college!"

"that's great. it sounds great, but the issue here is it just doesn't make any sense. don't any of you find it strange that all of a sudden, this boss-monster-looking alien shows up in a spaceship and starts going around saying that he's here for the good of both humans and monsters? isn't it strange that the first thing he does is start cozying up to the kids whose parents who just so happen to be the king and queen? just when you think you can trust in someone...that's when they jam a knife in your back."

"But Sans, he's kind of known me for almost five years now, since...that day—do you remember?"

"yeah, kid, how could i forget? maybe it was just a nice thing he felt like doing, but why is he still around? what's his game here? what's he trying to get out of us?"

With a charming naivete, Asriel replied, "Well, maybe he just did it because it was the right thing to do! And maybe he's still around because he cares about us!"

"heh, now you're starting to sound like papy—and that means i can't really argue with that. i just want to keep all of you safe, you know? you're like family to me."

"Now there's the big ol' softie we know and love! Come on, how about another round of tea?"

As if serving a cocktail, Undyne poured Sans a tall glass of tea and added a single squirt of ketchup on top. The skeleton raised the glass and took a hearty sip, tomato-flavored condiments and all, but nearly fumbled the drink out of his fingers when a two-armed, two-legged robot burst into the living room from a side door. Dr. Gaster and his assistant followed shortly with armfuls of tools and metal parts.

"Wait! We haven't finished re-configuring the capacitor banks yet!"

A mechanical voice shushed them and replied, "That can wait. Somebody turn on the news _now_!"

* * *

Mettaton NEO 295 AT 90 DF

*Right arm cannon reverse-engineered from lightbombs.

*Fixed-wing jetpack attached.

*Armor plating meticulously crafted from an alloy of steel and a substance code-named "TeA".

*Really shiny.

* * *

The king shook his head and asked, "Dr. Gaster...just why did you and Chara's brother feel the need to build a killer death machine?"

"Your Highness, I was reorganizing our files when I found the blueprints for the Human Eradication Device you told Dr. Alphys to design. They were halfway drawn and Mr. Antagonist thought they looked interesting, so we figured we may as well finish something already started."

The queen looked ready to slap her husband across the face.

"Really, Gorey? A 'Human Eradication Device'? Tell me, what else happened during my stay in the Ruins?"

"Tori..."

"You weren't thinking of sending this up to the surface, were you?"

"No worries, Dreemurr. We only intended to use the pulse cannon and bomb launcher to demolish some of the ruins of the nearby human village. Obviously, nobody's lived there for quite some time after they were driven away, but the land could be useful for us in the future."

"Well, I suppose those stone hunks are a bit of an eyesore..."

"Yeah, yeah, everything's beautiful and I'm as fabulous as ever..." Mettaton interjected. "But seriously, turn on the TV! There's something you must see and it isn't even my show! It's _that_ important!"

Sans telekinetically grabbed the remote and flicked on Alphys's giant television. The channel was already set to Global News Network, but they had just missed the programming and a forgettable ad about home security systems was playing. The next ad, however, caught everyone's attention faster than a sack of diamonds. A picture of a familiar-looking volcanic cavern plastered itself onto the screen, followed by a moderately dispassionate voice-over.

 _"Everyone knows that monsters live underneath our feet, but have we ever stopped to look at the facts?"_

The picture changed to one of the Dreemurrs and agents confronting the UNSC at Switzerland, color removed and shading altered to darken their faces.

 _"Monsters. They walk and talk like men, but have the faces and features of goats. They have horns, and sharp teeth, and one of them even carries a blazing red pitchfork."_

Asgore looked embarrassed, but the next picture was an unflattering shot of Toriel producing a fireball during the Teller trial.

 _"They interfere with our daily lives to get what they want, and when they don't, they use demonic arcane powers to bend us to their will. Let's put the facts together here. Who...what do you think those ungodly creatures really are?"_

The last picture was of a da Vinci human drawing, rendered in modern orange graphics against a white background.

 _"This message was sponsored by the Earth Defense Force. One planet, one people, and one future."_

The ad quickly switched to a harmless public service announcement about animal cruelty awareness. Undyne was the first to snap out from utter speechlessness, shouting, "What the hell was that?! Can they just get away with trashing us like this?"

"Well...it's their TV stations. There's not much we can do about it, I'm afraid."

"But it's not fair! Now the other humans will never let you stay on the surface! Can't you science up a TV blocker or mind eraser thingamajig?"

"Sorry, Chara. We just don't have that kind of technology or lack of ethics yet."

"Mom, Dad, _you're_ not going to let them get away with this, are you?"

"Of course not, dear. We'll be having a talk with the humans soon. This is absolutely unacceptable."

Frisk's phone started ringing.

"Hello?"

"Hey. Did you guys catch the attack ad that just aired?"

"Yeah, why?"

"Frisk, who is it?"

The child mouthed "It's _him_ " and put the caller on speaker. Someone shouted from across the room, "Can _you_ and your space buddies science up a mind blocker thingamajig?"

"Um...no. It looks bad, I know, but sit tight. A little voice says the next item on GNN's lineup is going to be _very, very_ interesting. Let's just say we're taking full advantage of not having to hide our spaceships from the humans anymore."

Just as Frisk's caller predicted, a man and a woman were now presenting a special news report on the TV. The anchorman started, "Earlier today, the steel cables suspending the Grand Harbour Bridge over its namesake river experienced a mechanical failure, sending hundreds of motorists into the near-freezing water."

"That's right. This accident had all the earmarks of a terrible disaster, but tragedy was averted when, of all things, a bunch of _monsters_ sprung in and heroically rescued the motorists from the icy river. We're now turning to helicopter footage of the events as they unfolded."

The TV cut to an aerial view of the suspension bridge and zoomed into the north cables just in time to record one of them snapping like a twig. A second snapped soon after, followed by a third, and the bridge began to sway like a flag unfurling in the wind. The camera followed a group of people as they fled from their cars and hurried to the north end of the road, but before they could get back to solid ground, one half of the bridge detached from its supports and plummeted into the water—cars, helpless drivers, everything.

The helicopter banked toward the river as if to help, but all of a sudden, a curved shadow appeared over the people flailing for their lives and stopped just beyond a cluster of sinking steel and concrete chunks. The camera panned slightly toward the source of the shadow and captured one of the carrier ships positioned over the river with all hatches opened. It zoomed in even further, recording dramatic footage of goat monsters in wetsuits swan-diving one-by-one from the spacecraft into the water, swimming to and grabbing onto one human each, and wormholing to the adjacent street before jumping back into the water to repeat the process. In about twenty minutes, they had collected every victim from the perilous water onto the wooden promenade bordering the river.

Waiting onshore were more monsters distributing blankets to shivering motorists and treating the injured with healing magic. They were surrounded by a dense ring of spectators and flashing cameras, which thinned out slightly to let an ambulance through but almost immediately squeezed itself shut as everyone tried to take a peek at the creatures from beneath the mountain.

Undyne pointed at a figure in the river, saying "Wait a minute...look in the water! I'd recognize those arms anywhere! Those crafty sons of goats got a couple of Waterfall monsters to ride along with them!"

"You don't think he planned all of this, did he?"

 _"Right, because I sent fighters all the way from ZY-9 to attack a random bridge and so perfectly timed a Carrier to fly by the second it failed...No, I didn't plan this."_

Everyone looked away from the TV. Frisk had forgotten to hang up the cell, which was still resting on the table and very capable of transmitting speakerphone-level sound from Alphys's lab.

"Yes, the timing is uncanny, but my colleagues really had nothing to do with the bridge collapsing. A couple monsters were heading out for a beach day, a Carrier happened to be making rounds over Mount Ebott, they offered to give them a ride, and then all the radio frequencies lit up with breaking news when they were about ten kilometers away from the bridge."

By now the TV had switched to a live, on-scene interview with the operation's acting commander.

"How did you all know there was trouble at the Grand Harbour Bridge?"

"We were actually flying to the beach—monsters like taking vacations, too—when the comms announced that something was wrong with the bridge. Our ship was close enough to investigate, so we took a quick detour. There were people and a lot of debris in the water; what else to do but get them out?"

"And 'get them out' you did. Zero casualties reported; that's very impressive, you know. Does your crew usually perform these kinds of rescue missions?"

"No, not specifically. I'm afraid today really was an odd day. If we can help, we'll help and we'll be glad to, but we aren't the local fire brigade. I'm sorry to disappoint, but we do have work to do that doesn't involve rescuing imperiled people all hours of the day. And seriously, fix your bridges!"

Alphys's guests sat down in silence for a moment. The TV cut back to the newsroom and the anchorpeople.

"And there you have it—today, a hundred lucky people found the chance to meet their _very_ unlikely guardian angels. Coming up—Immigration Reform, the UEG, and how it affects you."


	34. Reunion

"The motion to postpone discussion of Bill T-2J9IV carries. As such, there will be no further action on the trade agreement between the UEG and the Monster Kingdom until Parliament reconvenes in two weeks' time."

Negotiations had ground to a halt for the fifth time in a row. Even though Toriel and Asgore managed to pull the non-aggression treaty through the other humans, non-aggression was all the treaty stipulated. Humans and monsters were a little less wary of each other now than before, but a political bill to bring them any closer than neutrality was naively hopeful at best. Save for the inevitable odd encounter, the two civilizations kept to themselves as they had for thousands of years, with the monsters in and around the Mount Ebott region and the humans controlling every other part of the surface. The king and queen expected this difficulty; their faces at the end of these sessions hardly showed disappointment anymore.

But today, their faces showed surprise. The other humans' faces did, too; there was a blunt thump coming from the doorway, and then another, but then the locked wooden door clicked and quietly bowed aside.

(Lock-picking: fast, easy, and doesn't need you to flail around like an intoxicated monkey.)

(Oh, please. I totally loosened that lock up for you…)

(Say that to your sore foot.)

Two goat monsters were standing in the entrance and bickering among themselves, unaware that the Parliament had fallen silent before their antics. It wasn't the entire representing body of the UEG; some of the members adamantly boycotted any and all meetings with Toriel and Asgore present, but close to five hundred humans, occupying five semicircular rows of benches surrounding an open floor and podium, had stopped shuffling through their papers and were now gawking at their unexpected visitors. One of the pair had a red scarf on and the other, a blue ribbon.

"Excuse me, are you two authorized to be here—"

"Oh! Um...hello."

"We're looking for a 'Queen Toriel' and a 'King Asgore' and ah, there they are."

The duo sauntered onto the debate floor. One of them took the podium while the other walked up the side stairs, bumped his way through fifteen seated people, and stood behind the royal family.

Toriel turned around and whispered, "Luna! What are you doing here? This is a very important meeting!"

The alien, slightly mocking but mostly teasing, whispered back, "Well, what's Frisk doing here at this so 'very important' meeting?"

Frisk was sitting in Asgore's lap. Between all the people and desks, there wasn't quite enough room to pull up another chair.

"I'm the ambassador! I get to be here and Chara and Asriel get to wait outside!"

"Really now? Heh, good on you."

"Yes, Frisk is the ambassador, but this truly is important. We're trying to make a good impression on the other representatives and random interruptions aren't helping. Now, if you could explain—"

"Um, what are you two doing here?"

One of the legislators had beaten the queen to the question.

The monster behind the podium tapped the microphone and answered, "My name is Zephyr. I am the Minister of Justice of Star System ZY-Alpha and I do apologize for appearing uninvited, but we have an urgent matter to discuss with the king and queen."

"Well, out with it, the meeting is over and you've already taken over the floor anyway."

"Your Highness, I need to know the status of the SOUL Harvester—"

(No, wait, don't call it that—)

That definitely got the humans talking again. Luna reached for his companion as if to grab the words out of the air, but there was nothing he could do.

"Soul harvester? What kind of sorcery is this?"

"Hey, I thought they said they weren't demons!"

"So, they can actually steal our souls?"

"Quick! Someone call security or a priest or van Helsing or something!"

(Did I say something? What do they want a singing van for?)

(Welcome back to the field, 'Z', here's your refresher on 'Things Not to Say'. Rule Number One: Magic scares most humans.)

The same human who asked the question spoke up again, this time shushing the others and responding, "Settle down, you lot; these rumors aren't new. It was fear over soul stealing that brought us into this mess, and I'd heavily advise against a _third_ war. But _you_ , Minister, you have a _lot_ of explaining to do."

"Very well then, I do suppose we owe you for the broken lock on the door."

"What did you mean by soul harvester?...Are you saying monsters can steal people's souls?...I don't know what that means, but it kills them, right?...Does it have something to do with the spaceships we've been seeing recently?...Who...what even are you?"

'Z' almost ducked under the podium to hide from the bombardment of questions, but took a deep breath and tapped the microphone again.

"'Who we are' sounds like the best place to start, so let's run through everything—from our beginnings to the spaceships to the monsters to the barrier to the SOUL Harvester. Everything. Listen up, and get comfortable."

* * *

 _"As I've said before, I am the Minister of Justice for ZY-Alpha. This is one of many star systems we've explored, but like all civilizations, we had a cradle. A 'Planet Zero' that birthed us, nurtured us, and blessed us with the ingenuity to grow out of our nest. Our snowy, Earth-like hearth thirty-nine light years away from here…we'll call it…Capricorn."_

 _"As you've probably guessed, we too evolved from warm-blooded animals. Like you, we learned to use tools, grow food, smelt metals, cure diseases, code computers, and tame the sciences. The only difference is that even though those achievements happened millions of years ago, we've never had many wars with each other. Perhaps the cold winters froze the infighting right out of us, or it's just our nature."_

 _"So, we built up our grand civilization from the icy ground. Soon enough, we mastered the basics of rocket technology and started building our very first spaceship. Progress was smooth, but then we hit a snag when the engineers got to designing the propulsion system."_

 _"Monsters are magically gifted. You're all aware of that, but it may surprise you to know that magic is a lot more than hurling colorful attacks at those looking to harm you; it's an intricate art that people can spend lifetimes studying and, in the right, um…hands, it's safe and rather beautiful. Well, some of our engineers were those people, and they ended up drawing two competing designs for the rocket engine. One of them burned fuel like your Earth rockets, but the other harnessed the magical energy of nearby monsters like a solar panel. Either would have worked, we know this now, but the deadline was fast approaching and only one design could be installed onto the spaceship."_

 _"There were still lots of parts to design, and they were willing to work together for those, but their feuding only got worse as things got checked off and the missing propulsion system got harder to ignore. The arguments burned hotter with each day until they stopped talking to each other completely. Unable to fight each other directly, they spread vile rumours about each other throughout the rest of the facility. There were even allegations of the engineers stealing parts from each other at the height of their infighting; all progress on the ship ground to a halt and unless they re-focused themselves, the launch would be postponed indefinitely."_

 _"But all of a sudden, the magic-leaning faction acquiesced and agreed to install the fuel engine. With less than a week to spare, the engineers finished the last part and the launch could proceed as scheduled. Their rivalry could have spelled doom for the entire space program, but luckily, they put it aside just in time for our historic first launch."_

 _"Everyone was either crowded around the launch pad or had their eyes glued to the nearest television. Mission Control started their countdown; as the seconds ticked away, the ground around the facility rumbled with greater and greater anticipation. When they finally said 'zero', there was a bright flash and the ship lifted off the ground, being carried toward the heavens on a pillar of fire as everyone below cheered."_

 _"But then, an alarm sounded from inside the spaceship. Panicked voices were shouting that something was wrong with the engine, but before Mission Control could respond, the ship disintegrated into a fireball and killed everybody onboard. For a moment, our planet stood still in one big display of shock; all the children were crying and none of the adults could believe the tragedy they just witnessed."_

 _"Yes, we could have just built another ship, but that one was the pride and joy of the entire planet. It was the culmination of all our technology and knowledge, and to have it all go up in flames like that; well, it was almost like losing a child."_

 _"Blame found itself quickly settling on those feuding engineers. The magic-leaning ones insisted that the launch would have gone smoothly if only the magic drive was used, and the science-leaning ones retaliated by accusing the magicians of sabotaging their design. Those accusations were baseless; the engine failed because it was a rushed, sloppy job, but in its fervent desire for answers, our society latched onto the accusations. The scientists had turned the magicians into scapegoats practically overnight."_

 _"Generally speaking, people who hold degrees in magic tend to be very, very good at it, and if there's someone you really don't want to ruin the lives of, it's the people who can design a heat shield and then melt it with a single fireball. Fired from their posts and credibility up in flames, the magicians continued meeting in secret, using their engineering skills to concoct a revenge plot."_

 _"And then one day, the magicians stormed the facility. Fueled by hatred and beyond all sanity, they ruthlessly attacked and slaughtered their former colleagues. We don't know if the scientists intended to destroy their lives so thoroughly with the accusations, but they paid the ultimate price for it. Security was called in, of course, but when they tried to apprehend the magicians, their attacks bounced harmlessly off the invaders as if they were foam darts. That's when they saw it: the lead magician holding a pulsating red crystal in one paw and a handful of their colleague's SOULs with the other."_

* * *

"Now wait just a second here. You've mentioned 'souls' a few times now and you're referring to them as if they were things you could pick up and throw down the lane. What exactly is a 'soul'?"

'Z' looked at the legislator as if they had just asked if the sky was blue. Every monster and Frisk clearly saw an upright, colored heart floating faintly around each human's chest, but none of the MPs would ever believe her if she started talking about glowing lights in their bodies. Having never experienced magic before, the humans simply didn't know what to look for.

She'd have to show them. 'Z' raised a paw and lifted one of the more petite questioners out of their seat by telekinetic power. As they rose into the air, their SOUL glowed a much brighter shade of orange; bright enough for the other MPs to gasp and point at their floating colleague.

"My God! It's like a campfire! And look at the talking goat's; it's like a light bulb!"

"This...is a SOUL: the embodiment of everything you are, from your hopes and dreams to your personality and memories. Humans' are upright and colorful and tend to retain their magical energy; ours are inverted and white and magical energy flows freely through them. Yours are resilient and hold hundreds of times more power than ours; ours are fragile but can channel power into magical spells."

"And by 'fragile', we mean all it takes are a few well-placed hits under the right conditions. The absolute worst sound you could ever hear sounds like glass shattering combined with the last cries of a dying breath. If you think monsters are scary; well, the feeling's mutual sometimes."

* * *

 _"Anyway, that crystal was the SOUL Harvester, the fruit of many secret meetings and a weapon of unprecedented power. Like their magic drive, it worked by draining a small amount of nearby SOULs' magical energy, but in exchange, the wielder gained the ability to absorb other SOULs. With each SOUL collected, both the wielder and the Harvester gained significant power. The security forces were overrun in minutes; their SOULs being added to the Harvester as they perished."_

 _"Absorbing a SOUL and forcibly tapping into its power like that...it's incredibly unethical and horribly traumatic for the SOUL. It's no better than forcing someone to kill their friends, but those magicians had already been lost. With several dozen SOULs to twist their minds, the magicians turned on the rest of the facility and added hundreds more. They killed so quickly and thoroughly that by the time the military arrived, the magicians had a thousand SOULs at their disposal. The soldiers were crushed, too, and by now, the magicians had closer to a thousand SOULs each. They had gained so much power that it was affecting their bodies; their eyes glowed, their teeth sharpened, and their skin displayed black burn marks from sheer overflowing energy. Rapidly running out of options, the commanders authorized an aerial attack and managed to put down everyone but the lead magician."_

 _"That was a tactical blunder. Harvester still in paw, the last magician absorbed every SOUL their fallen allies held and now possessed tens of thousands of them. With that much power, they transformed into a great, terrifying beast. Their black wings were the size of buildings and shimmered with an iridescent rainbow light. Their paws swatted fighter planes out of the sky by the dozens and flattened tanks with a single crushing blow, and that's only when they weren't incinerating entire blocks with an electromagnetic rainbow beam. Millions of soldiers gave their lives to stop them, and millions of SOULs joined with the Harvester's core. They were nigh unstoppable at that point. Entire armies and cities fell to the angel of death, their inhabitants' SOULs being reaped throughout the massacre."_

 _"I suppose now you expect me to introduce the hero who overcomes insurmountable odds and slays the demon and saves the world, but that miracle never happened. We only survived by moving underground, hiding for our lives like the most pathetic groundhogs possible, terrified to step foot onto the soil of our own planet. Instead of triumphing over the enemy, we simply waited until they passed of their own age. Their massive body decayed to leave behind that accursed crystal, still shining in a dirt patch like a blood ruby."_

 _"That crystal wiped out over ninety-five percent of our numbers. It had to be destroyed, obviously, but we couldn't. Those engineers were too crafty for their own good and built the darned thing to be indestructible. Our only other option was to move the crystal off our planet to make another genocide impossible. We built a second rocket to hold the crystal and a few dozen of us volunteered to pilot it as far away from us as possible. They did all of this under orders to jump through as many wormholes as they could, whether by magic or by onboard generator, and disappear from the face of the universe, fully knowing that they would never return to their home planet again, and we owe them our deepest respects."_

 _"Some time into their journey, their ship apparently reached Earth. The crew members hid the SOUL Harvester away in the Mount Ebott region and built a small settlement in the nearby grasslands to guard it. As the generations passed, our DNA ended up mixing with DNA on Earth; quite literally, the crew 'disappeared' by blending and spreading into their new environment."_

* * *

"That artifact...have we been playing the role of gatekeepers all along?"

"Yes, your Highness; every moment you've all spent living around Mount Ebott is a moment inadvertently spent guarding our most dangerous super-weapon. And for that, I think we owe you an apology. Maybe the original crew did, but none of you consented to being our faithful guardians. I can only hope that this weapon wasn't a spark for the first Human-Monster War. It goes without saying at this point, but your doctor was more than correct, your Highness: caprines and not only Boss Monsters, but monsters in general are essentially the same. Monsters usually have a greater proportion of Earth DNA, but sometimes _our_ genes re-emerge and; well, you end up as a talking goat Boss Monster thing."

"But this isn't the 'everything' she promised you, I admit. The next parts deeply involve humanity, so it would only be fair if some among you crowding around us enlightened us all about what you've done these past few millennia. Well? Your history can't be _that_ horrifying, can it? Who among you would like to volunteer?"


	35. Test

Some of the MPs had honored Luna's request, chipping in various bits of their home countries' recorded histories to bridge the expanse of time between the first Human-Monster War and the expeditiously resolved second one. Many were the amazing feats and leaps in technology, but the human leaders felt obligated to admit their darker days along with the prouder moments. A million enslaved here...a million cut down there...and the visitor behind the podium grew more visibly uncomfortable with each statistic.

"...oh. That's...wow."

"They _are_ giving us the short and bittersweet version, after all. I imagine none of us will have any trouble studying the details in a library, and whether they're horrifying or not, it might _still_ be too early for us to judge them, 'Z'."

"Yes, but...wow. And all those fusion warheads are still active?"

The lead MP shrugged.

"Yes. I realize they're not the first impression we are looking for, but you of all monsters should recognize the importance of being able to defend your home against monumental threats. Those spaceships are not hostile, but imagine if the next armada on our doorstep decides not to be so cordial with us. Our defenses aren't solely _our_ defenses anymore—they're the Monster Kingdom's too. By maintaining the ability to deal with threats to global peace, we safeguard the futures of all of Earth's inhabitants."

Peace through the instruments of war. The idea wasn't completely lacking in logic. After all, the caprines maintained fleets of armed battleships and fighters even if no immediate war was being fought. What difference would substituting one set of fusion-powered war machines for another make?

"Very well then, but rediscovering a population like this is about as unprecedented for us as finding men on Mars for you. If ZY-9 hasn't a single plan for this situation, how can we be sure that the UEG's strategy will prove successful at protecting our kin?"

"The doctrine is similar to the 'Mutually Assured Destruction' of fifty years past. Any attack by a belligerent nation will be met with appropriate force from the UNSC's coalition forces, with the nuclear weapons as a last resort. Granted, the UEG and UNSC have only existed since the Golden Flowers Incident, but no army would ever be so foolish as to call total annihilation upon itself."

Nobody looked satisfied nor the least bit comfortable with the nuclear option. Glancing at their peers' faces, the lead MP mulled over a few other solutions.

"How about if the UEG recognizes the Monster Kingdom and its inhabitants as an independent entity? If the monsters can provide for their own defense, they need not be involved with nuclear anything."

Toriel, Asgore, and Frisk seemed much more content with this approach. However, Luna and Zephyr still shared a few lukewarm qualms.

(They'd need a proper military, wouldn't they? One far beyond the scope of their little "Royal Guard," too.)

(Yes, and a military requires personnel...a large population to draw from...I doubt they have those kinds of numbers packed underneath the mountain. Still, it's worth a try...)

"Your Highnesses, have either of you received contact from monsters outside of Mount Ebott who aren't ours? Do you know of any other 'kingdoms' besides yours on Earth?"

"I'm afraid not, Minister. By our knowledge, Mount Ebott contains the only survivors of the war."

A small glimmer in the back of 'Z's eye died upon hearing those words. The time when humans and monsters ruled the Earth was long gone.

"Then we have a problem once more. Building an army from scratch is already difficult, and in our opinion as officers of the sword ourselves, it'd be a futile effort given the size of your population."

"What if the space monsters supply the army? If you two can send ships to any corner of the Earth, then surely you possess the capability of defending a single mountain range."

'Z' shook her head almost reflexively.

"Bad idea. It all goes back to something we've feared ever since we announced ourselves to Earth—that you believe we're a hostile invasion force. To reiterate, since some of you look ready to bolt out of the chamber: we have absolutely no intention of colonizing Earth nor do we mean harm to it."

"Then what is your business here? What's this 'Morality Bureau' our justice committee keeps hearing about?"

"Ah, the M.B. We've made a fair amount of noise, haven't we? Truth be told, we are primarily the _intelligence division_ of the caprines' armed forces."

"Intelligence as in cloaks and daggers?"

"We point, the regulars shoot, but since not a lot of shooting has happened lately, they shuffled us around and we picked up the role of 'peacekeepers'. Our latest (and ongoing) project has been preparing a safer environment for our recently unearthed allies. I suppose the M.B. could help with the defense—we certainly have the resources for it even if it isn't our role to—but placing a standing army of aliens around Mount Ebott is asking for trouble. At best that'll be another last resort, but we'll keep a close eye on the mountain in addition to our usual business."

"And what business is that?"

"Peacekeeping; employing our information-gathering skills to monitor and neutralize threats to the safety of the galaxy. Priority One is tracking down the former inhabitants of Haven; those villagers represent a double attempted murder as of yet unresolved."

"But years have passed. Furthermore, isn't it true that a state of war still existed at that time? Without the force of the current treaty, those villagers had substantial grounds to defend themselves."

"Then in that case, they deliberately targeted unarmed civilians; kids, even. _That's a war crime_ by your standards and ours, and all the more reason to pursue them. Of course, chasing a cold case with limited information turns up many false leads and unrelated criminals. If you've ever received an unusually helpful tip or had a fugitive suddenly turn themselves in or just up and vanish from the face of Earth; well, that might be our doing."

Luna grinned and remarked, "This shouldn't be a problem to the UEG, should it? Our poking around the planet is hardly different from the many dozens of probes you've shot at other planets so far."

"No, no, no, this is definitely a problem," the officials grumbled. "We can't allow you to run around the planet 'gathering information'; this is a jurisdiction conflict at minimum and easily a major security breach."

The minister sighed and offered, "We don't intend to usurp existing channels of law enforcement; our priority will always be our own business. On the other hand, we are not savages; we understand the value of cooperation and we could help the long arm of the law reach places it normally couldn't."

The MPs replied, but whether they acquiesced or refused was of little importance. All their words would change was _how_ covertly their visitors from space would operate.

"Very well then. Now, returning to our original matter...Toriel, Asgore, Capricorn is confident that it can destroy the SOUL Harvester once and for all. We're both eternally grateful and regretful that you've unwittingly guarded it for these long years, but if you would be so kind as to allow us to retrieve that vile 'artifact', we'll take it to the center of the galaxy, drop it into the black hole, and finally bring our sorry tale to a close."

"Wait."

It wasn't the Dreemurrs. The lead MP had raised a palm, gesturing as if to signal somebody to halt. 'Z', genuinely surprised, felt her hide stand slightly more on end.

"Excuse me?"

"Is destroying it truly the only reasonable option? There is a plethora of knowledge we could gain from such an alien artifact, and if the space goats have decided to toss it out like an old sofa, we'll gladly accept it."

"What? No, the Harvester is a weapon, and a massively destructive one at that. Anything you could possibly gain from it will only further the development of the instruments of war."

"Now, we need not be so hasty with this; what if the Harvester has a beneficial use that's still waiting to be discovered?"

"Then we'll make that discovery through another line of research; one that doesn't involve enslaving living SOULs. We _will_ be taking the Harvester, human, and you will not stop us."

"But that isn't fair. If you were going to discard it, then we have a legal right to claim it as abandoned property. What should it matter to you lot as long as it's out of your sight?"

"That planet destroyer should never have existed in the first place! Why are you all so interested in pieces of monster tech all of a sudden? Unless...you wish to reverse engineer the Harvester and add magical super-weapons to your arsenal...yes, that must be it...I warn you now, on behalf of the caprines: if these are the aspirations of humans, we _will_ be forced to renege on that 'non-invasion' promise."

"I assure you on behalf of the UEG; our intentions are purely academic. From the day the first man stepped foot onto the Moon, _we_ promised we would enter our most mysterious frontier in peace."

'Z' wasn't buying it. A quick glance at her counterpart's face revealed agreement, but the other alien looked like he had more to say.

"I'm afraid to admit it, but...the humans may have a point with their 'beneficial use' ploy. Just not in the way they're describing. If you'll excuse me; there's someone I need to find. It'll be easier to show exactly what I mean."

Luna whispered something to Toriel and Asgore, who whispered back and pointed toward the unlocked door. The alien exited, and after a few uncomfortable minutes, he returned with Asriel's arm in paw. Chara followed the two in shortly after, giving a slight wave to Frisk and then leaning against the wall in her best attempt at a stone-chill palace guard.

"This is the prince, correct? What are you getting at here?"

" _Fight him_."

"Wait, what—"

"Don't actually attack him, of course, just engage him in a combat stance and you'll realize what I'm trying to say."

The king and queen breathed a collective sigh of relief. Meanwhile, 'Z' stepped away from the podium and manifested a compound bow in her paws, curved, black, shadowy body and purple outline like her counterpart's swords and an ethereal quiver on her back stuffed full of magical arrows. Every so often, an electric spark ran up one of the shafts and arced across the arrowheads.

(What? Why are you looking at me like that?)

(Oh, nothing. Asriel's staring confusedly at your 'indirect' magic weapon; seems like they don't use a lot of those down there.)

* * *

Asriel Dreemurr 51 AT 55 DF

*LV 4.

*Inverted white SOUL...Upright Green SOUL...Upright Purple SOUL...

* * *

Both 'Z' and her own white SOUL flinched from the carousel of hearts, startled paw sending an arrow into the roof, where it disintegrated with a tiny flash of lightning.

"The prince! To think absorbing one SOUL is grave enough, but six? How did this even happen?"

"Umm...it's kind of a long story—"

'Z' shushed Asriel and continued, "Never mind that; we have to extract those SOULs immediately. If we're lucky, their rightful bodies haven't decomposed yet."

None of the Dreemurrs nor Luna wanted to hear anything remotely resembling an extraction given their ultimate run-in with the rogue scientist.

"That's easier said than done, I'm afraid. The prince's right, it's a long story _like it always is_ around the Bureau, but these six SOULs are all casualties from the first Human-Monster War, preserved for all this time in some sort of stasis tanks. They were instrumental in helping Asriel to destroy the barrier, willingly and symbiotically sharing their power to overcome the seven-SOUL threshold. Until we have the details regarding how the barrier was created, that artifact represents the monsters' only defense against future barrier attacks."

'Z' sighed.

"Words cannot describe how frustrating it is to admit it, but you're right. We can't destroy the Harvester yet. In this case, it'd be best if we transported it to ZY-9 for safekeeping. It'd be a strategic blunder to entrust _anyone_ , human or monster, with both the venom and the antidote; since someone or something from Earth created the barrier, our only countermeasure must never be allowed into that someone's hands."

Asriel looked worried.

"But wait! If the artifact leaves Earth, what will happen to the human SOULs? They aren't going to...die, are they?"

'Z' speechlessly scratched her chin for a moment before answering, "That's an interesting point...the Harvester clearly affects SOULs in a limited range, but in our rush to dispose of it we never discovered whether the SOUL absorption ability is permanent. Asriel, if it fades away, you will no longer be able to hold onto the SOULs; they'll detach and persist for some time, but yes...without a body, they will succumb to their metabolism of stored magical energy and eventually die."

"But...but they were just kids. We can't just let them die like that...the artifact's sitting in a locked, hidden room right now; what if we leave it right where it is? Then it'd still be safe but we wouldn't need to worry about it being too far away!"

The prince had rendered 'Z' speechless for a different reason entirely.

" _Ma petite chèvre_...If you're truly willing to care for and protect these six humans, sacrificing part of your body so that six children may have a chance to experience a full life...well, I think I understand why Luna speaks so highly of you. I've no intention of standing in your way, so allow me to offer a different suggestion."

" _Leave this planet behind and come with us._ "

"Wha...what?!"

"I know, I know. 'Earth is your home' and all those sentiments. But if you'll give me a chance to plead my case, I think this could truly be the best arrangement for everyone. Dreemurrs, you and the humans signed a peace treaty, and that's a remarkable achievement, but do you honestly expect a piece of paper to cover up eons of hostilities? How long do you expect a peace to last with a race that can't go one decade without waging war on itself?"

"But that was the past, and the new United Earth Government—"

"Invaded the Monster Kingdom, shot at an eleven-year-old with a high-powered rifle, and shot at my field commander when they missed him. But suppose those events were all a giant hiccup on the UEG's part and we give them the maximum possible benefit of the doubt. Even so, ZY-9 can provide the highest standard of living in the entire solar system. The infrastructure can easily handle more occupants and you'll certainly fit right in and feel at home. If that doesn't suit you, there are dozens of habitable planets and moons you could settle; I admit asking 'Why share a planet when you can have your own?' is a little indiscreet, but you could literally live among the stars. Wouldn't that make it worthwhile?"

"Minister...we can't just leave. Please understand."

Determination shifting to desperation, 'Z' continued right over the Dreemurrs, "And maybe...maybe we just want our _family_ to come home after millions of years apart. Maybe we're afraid of losing them again and maybe...this is just wistful thinking, isn't it? We can't bribe you into uprooting your lives here and you won't give up on peace quite so easily. It's just not in the human spirit to give in; hmph, perhaps your neighbors have rubbed off on you after all. Fine, Dreemurr, you win, but we still need to study the Harvester even if it stays here."


	36. Archaic

Another gamma-burst tore through the air. Its target reappeared a few dozen meters away and took aim at the alien, one paw tightly gripping a bow and the other drawing its elastic string. Luna ducked to avoid the first arrow and rushed the archer, hide tingling as another charged bolt passed inches by his right. Now face-to-face, he swung and stabbed carefully at the agile figure; who grabbed another arrow out of her quiver and pushed back with a few quick jabs of their own. The alien watched the purplish blur of the "dagger" as it thrust forward—perhaps a little too forward—he grabbed the enemy's wrist and forced the impromptu knife out of her paw.

The figure, only momentarily surprised, kicked her opponent away and summoned a ball of blue lightning, floating just above her left paw and zapping the air around it with forked bolts. Before Luna could reposition himself, the orb crashed into the earth before his feet and exploded into a blinding flash. The brunt of the attack had fallen short of hitting its mark, but when the light subsided, the alien's hide had puffed into a fluffy cotton ball.

"I can hear giggles! What'd you do to me?"

'Z' covered her mouth and snickered, "What? Static electricity is a good look for you! A little ridiculous, but now they'll be too busy laughing to defend themselves!"

A slightly unappreciative Luna materialized and launched a flare at Zephyr with his free paw, edge nearly grazing her shoulder as she evaded with a quick sidestep. 'Z' retaliated with a forceful telekinetic push, sticking out both of her palms to send her counterpart flying into the air. Another arrow in paw, she leaped toward the other monster for a tackle, kicking up a cloud of dirt beneath her feet, but stopped just short of knocking him over when something sharp brushed against her hide. When the dust settled, Luna had the sword resting beside 'Z's neck while 'Z' had the arrow's tip under Luna's chin. They locked eyes with each other for a moment, watching for the slightest twitch in the other's paw, but simultaneously de-summoned their weapons.

* * *

Luna HP: 275,000

Zephyr HP: 250,000

* * *

"Hmph, a stalemate. Guess that means I owe you an apology for those desk job jokes."

"Just like the good old days, hmm? You were right; I really need to get back out there; almost forgot how exciting the odd roll in the dirt can be."

"Definitely. Now, which of you three had money on a tie?"

Frisk grinned and stuck out both her hands. Asriel and Chara, standing by her left and right, both grumbled and handed their sister one pristine chocolate bar each.

"Darn it, I want a rematch! Double or nothing! His fur's already messed up, so it won't distract him this time!"

"Did you see how fast that lightning blast went? There's no way he can dodge it again!"

"But he uses swords! All he has to do is get close and 'Z's bow will be useless!"

"But then she'll just stab him with the arrow. Come on, Azzy, trust me on this and Frisk'll owe us _four_ candy bars!"

"Hate to disappoint you three, but I do have a meeting with Mrs. Rockefeller in an hour. Missing people just don't find themselves, I'm afraid. We'll have to save that rematch for another time, okay?"

A starfighter de-cloaked on a patch of grass fifty meters away. 'Z' waved goodbye, hopped into the cockpit, and disappeared into the clear sky.

"I know her; she won't leave this without trying to get one up on me. While we wait, why don't we check on the Harvester? Just show us the way."

"The normal entrance will take us through all of Hotland; it's hot and gross but a shorter walk than going through the Ruins."

Luna and company trekked toward the cave in the east face of the mountain. After passing a familiar brick home, a sweltering cauldron of magma, and several refreshing neon-blue rivers, they found themselves before a dusty old piano and a solid wall of rock. Asriel sat down in front of the keys and played a light melody; as the notes echoed around the chamber, a rectangular slab of limestone retracted into the wall and slid aside. Inside the secret alcove was the red destroyer of planets, resting inertly on its stone pedestal. The alien picked it up, slowly turning and examining the sticky sphere in his paw.

"Whoa! Frisk!"

"What?"

"Your eyes! They're red!"

Luna turned around. Frisk's eyes were indeed glowing a faint shade of crimson, barely illuminating her face but not much else.

"But…but Chara's the one with red eyes. My eyes are brown! What's happening to me?"

"So, I take it that red eye color isn't common among humans; anyway, just stay calm…"

The alien gingerly approached Frisk with the artifact, first walking towards her with the sphere out like a flashlight and then wrapping her fingers around the sphere with his own, red aura growing a little more intense as the artifact came closer.

* * *

Frisk 70 AT ? DF

*HP: 19/19

*?!

* * *

"Talk to me, kid. How do you feel?"

"I…I feel okay, actually. My feet feel a little lighter somehow, and my hands…I feel like I could move a mountain with them if I tried…"

"But according to this scanner you've _lost_ one HP. It's a tiny amount, but certainly you shouldn't be feeling healthier with your SOUL diminished."

"Maybe Dr. Alphys could tell us what's going on?"

* * *

"'Equilibria'…the city only fifteen miles east-southeast of Mount Ebott. Living this close to us, they're either friendly, brave, or cocky."

"I appreciate you meeting me like this, 'Z'. I know it must be awkward for you to venture out here."

"It's…fine…really…this is about you and your daughter, after all."

The goat monster and the lawyer were sitting on opposite sides of a booth, separated by a glass table against the polished window of a fancy modern café. Rockefeller tried to help her companion feel comfortable, ordering hot roasted coffee and wonderful-smelling pastries for the two of them, but 'Z' could never fully relax into her upholstered seat, legs crossed defensively and claws impatiently tapping the table's edge. Voices and murmurs kept pricking at her ears and out of the corner of her eye, someone at a different table always seemed to be staring.

 _"Over there! It's like a walking, talking bunny rabbit! What do you think it's doing with that lady?"_

Then there was a flash from a smartphone's lens. And another. And another.

"For goodness sakes, I'm a monster, okay?!"

'Z' shot up from her seat like a spring. Anyone in the immediate vicinity who wasn't staring before was definitely gawking now. Embarrassed, the goat monster slumped back into the booth and tried to hide her face.

"I don't even like coffee, Ellie…and I'm not fine either. Just…tell me a little more about her; something to focus on might be exactly what I need."

"Well, actually, her name is Ellie."

"Oh! I'm sorry…I didn't realize—"

"It's okay. Cute, isn't it? 'Ellie and Ellie'. Anyway, she was nine. A little over four feet but a bit stronger and quicker than she looks."

"So, she'd be about thirteen now…maybe a little over five feet and being tough on the outside certainly helps her chances. Can you describe Ellie's usual outfit?"

"She liked—no, _likes_ putting her long, brown hair in a ponytail. She wears glasses, umm…jackets, jeans, boots no matter the weather outside."

"Good. This is good. I don't think her wardrobe preferences would change so quickly, so the profile should start to come together now. Now, to make sure it's truly Ellie, could you tell me about her personality?"

"She's very curious, adventurous, resolute, the kind of person for whom 'giving up' doesn't exist—I told your coworker about how she always carried a journal with her…oh, God! What if that journal's all that's left of her? What if—"

"Shh…you're doing fine. I know I'm in no position to guarantee anything, but wherever Ellie is right now, she needs her mother to believe in her. We'll find her, okay?"

'Z' slid her still-full mug of coffee across the table, inviting the lawyer to take a nice, long sip.

"As I said: I don't even like coffee."

Rockefeller took a nice, long sip.

"Better?"

"Sort of."

"Now then, I'm afraid I may have saved the worst for last, but this is probably the most important. I need you to recall everything Ellie did on the day she went missing. If you can't, it's fine. If you feel uncomfortable, then tell me and we'll ease our way through together, but any detail could become a valuable lead."

"She had a school field trip that day…they were learning about ancient civilizations and organized a dig with the local archaeological society. I was worried it could be dangerous for her to be stumbling around some rocky ruins, but this was the one thing she was passionate about. How could I say no? I kissed her goodbye as she got on the eight o'clock school bus, but I didn't think her teacher would call and say…"

The lawyer stopped suddenly. It was admirable that she pushed so far, 'Z' thought, but surely the tears and despair were finally coming. The monster reached for a napkin, but then Rockefeller started chuckling to herself.

"Elena…? How are you feeling?"

"It's funny, isn't it? Surrounded by a bunch of staring people, feeling like a zoo animal on display, and you're worrying about whether _I'm_ uncomfortable."

"Heh…I guess it is. I think some fresh air will do us both good; where did you say those ruins were?"

* * *

"Doctor."

"Commander."

Gaster was alone in the laboratory living room, cup of tea in one hand and the latest medical journal in another three. It was extraordinarily difficult for Luna to even hold a cordial conversation with his former nemesis of many years, but Frisk's condition demanded that he give it a whole-hearted try.

"How goes the test tubing?"

"Right on schedule; Dr. Alphys and Chara's brother should be commencing our first field test of Mettaton NEO momentarily."

"That's the magic calculator, right? What'd you do, make it solar-powered?"

"It's…classified."

"…"

"…"

(Gets his lab back and now he's all high and mighty and king of the castle…whatever, I didn't want to know anyway.)

The alien walked Frisk into the same glass chamber Alphys analyzed him with and started up the scanning procedure. While the teal laser glided over the human, Luna called Gaster over and handed him a few notes for comparison.

"So, this is Frisk before, and this is Frisk now after touching that artifact stashed in Waterfall. The drastic increase in AT and eye color shift would make sense if Frisk used the Harvester to absorb a SOUL, but that clearly didn't happen, so what happened to her?"

"Hmm…didn't your partner say that the artifact drew magical energy from nearby SOULs to power itself?"

"Yes, that's correct."

Gaster disappeared into a storeroom and returned with a rolled-up blueprint, plastering it on the table to show a highly detailed model of an inverted SOUL.

"Considering that it was invented for monsters by monsters, the siphoning was probably designed with monster SOULs in mind. We know monster SOULs permit the free flow of magical energy and human SOULs resist it; this is why we have these powers and they don't. But…if the Harvester forcibly drained magical energy from Frisk's SOUL like a vacuum, then would not magical energy technically be freely flowing through that SOUL?"

"So, Frisk's going to turn into a monster? No fair! I want horns to headbutt people with!"

"Um, no. Well, not quite. Frisk's SOUL turned just monster enough to put together an attack or two, and we're still not sure how long it'll last. But you already know a bit of magic, don't you, Frisk? If you tried now, you may find it more potent and less tiring to use."

The human stepped out of the chamber, concentrated with all her strength, and materialized a red, translucent, crystalline, Delta Rune-style shield in her left hand. She slipped it around her forearm like a buckler, and when she waved it around, red particles floated off the magical construct like windblown dandelions.

"Hey, Azzy. Didn't I tell you I'd learn a 'shield' spell before you did?"

Asriel folded his arms and pouted.

* * *

Plains with a peaceful, warm breeze. Sophisticated concrete ruins, lightly charred and scattered from a single epicenter. Snow-capped mountains in the background, two trails leading toward opposite cavern entrances. Among the piles of rubble expertly climbed a goat monster and awkwardly stumbled a human.

" _Here?_ Their field trip was _here_? Who thought this was a good idea?"

"These are the most recent ruins in existence. Not of much value to an ancient historian, but contemporariness makes it interesting to otherwise bored kids. Plus, there was always the slight chance of spotting a 'mythical' monster, so how could a kid resist?"

'Z' picked up a hunk of rubble and sniffed it, asking over her shoulder, "Did Ellie like chasing monsters?"

"No, well, not really…"

"Hmm?"

"Between you and me…I snuck a peek in her journal a few times. I know I shouldn't have; it was a private place, but curiosity got the best of me and I had to know what she spent all day drawing about. It was like a taxidermist's pocketbook, just pages upon pages of sketched flowers and leaves and animals big and small. They were really impressive, too; she could have just as easily been an artist."

"And one of them looked like a two-legged goat?"

"I'm no biologist. I don't know if I could tell the difference between a strange-looking real creature and a strange-looking daydream, but drawing magic two-legged horned goats…that's a little frowned-upon today."

The magic two-legged horned goat had climbed a toppled wall to the upper floor of one-half of what used to be a two-story building, still continuing the conversation by shouting over and around moderately charred walls and dilapidated debris. Instinctively, certain things about the landscape began to pop out at 'Z'. The crisscrossing, rectangular grid of streets, the golden high ground at the center of the town, and the gates—one facing north and the other south—jumped and pulled on her strands of tactical nerves.

"Go ahead and check the other buildings at ground level; I'm just using a new perspective to see which directions Ellie could have wandered off."

Rockefeller started toward the doorway of an indefinitely closed bakery, but as soon as she turned her head, an energy projectile streaked across the sky and impacted against the building 'Z' was in. Already weakened by years of decay, the walls shook and buckled and sent the entire second floor crashing down into the first in a cloud of concrete dust.

"Whoa, what the…Hey! Are you okay?"

There was no reply, but in the agonizing milliseconds before the lawyer's stomach dropped onto the ground, a human-like silhouette came stumbling out of the cloud, coughing every few steps before dropping to her paws and knees. 'Z' was shaking and breathing heavily, but seemingly avoided the brunt of the unknown assault. Still face down, the monster mumbled something that sounded like it had an 'a' and a lot of syllables.

"What?"

"Artillery! Head for that building!"

" _What?!_ "

'Z' grabbed Elena and hastily tugged her into the abandoned bakery. Poking their heads above the counter like a pair of terrified moles, they looked on as several more energy blasts exploded against the walls of buildings newly exposed behind the recently leveled heap.

"You…you have a lot of explaining to do…"

"What makes you think I had anything to do with this?"

"Fine…our only chance is to sneak toward whatever's firing off those bombs; we can't afford to wait until the next fighter makes rounds over the mountain and if we try to run away and get spotted, they'll blow us both to bits. No matter what happens outside, you stay here. Everything goes well, I'll be back to get you in a few minutes."

"Wait. Let me come with you."

"You can't be serious; you're a civilian! What could you possibly know about a direct combat situation?"

"I tear people apart four days a week on the witness stand. 'Far as I'm concerned, doing it here and now just gives me a chance to catch up on paperwork later."

"You can't possibly think that a live combat scenario compares to a courtroom…"

"I've literally been to space and back for the sake of this search. Listen to me, Fluffy: _I'm going to find my daughter and I'll be darned if a little firecracker is going to stop me._ "

"'Fluffy?'…fine, I'll just keep a healing spell ready then."

The human and the monster nudged open the back door and peeked out the crack. Seeing nobody, they darted across the cracked cobblestone street and ducked into the next storefront, island-hopping across the town as more glowing shells arced above their heads. At the sixth building, 'Z' silently opened the door again but quickly shut it and backed away.

"What's the matter? What did you see?"

"One armored mech thing. It was using an arm cannon to lob those bombs. If I can get behind it, I think I can short it out with a well-placed shock. Sounds easy, but if it has a proximity scanner or a retractable blade or any other surprises to go with the main cannon, well, I could take a nasty hit or two…yes…we'll need a distraction."

"Should I go out and draw its attention?"

"No…it would have either left or started chasing us after destroying the first building if we were its targets, and not a single other soul is here, so it must be firing randomly at what it thinks are empty buildings. It doesn't know we're here. Anything you do will probably surprise it, so just throw a rock and duck back in."

Rockefeller nodded, weighed a small chunk of debris in her hand, and chucked it towards the invader, catching a glimpse of its metallic face as she slammed the door shut. The nervous lawyer held her breath as heavy, clanking footsteps approached what still smelled of thick wood but felt increasingly like a sheet of tissue paper shielding her from the mechanical monstrosity outside.

The doorknob jiggled.

'Z' took the cue and jumped into a vortex; one second later, an electrical discharge crackled from outside. The human counted to three and gingerly pushed the door open again, immediately slamming it shut when she heard a growl crossed with a mechanical whir. Several blunt thumps followed, stopping only when an unfamiliar voice joined the commotion. Rockefeller peeked outside; across the street, a yellow lizard monster, arms outstretched, stood between the fighting goat and the mech.

"My, my…you're a feisty one!"

" _I'm_ the feisty one? You were bombing us into next week!"

"Both of you…I…I'm really sorry! I didn't know you were in that building!"

"Truth be told, I never really liked this town or any ofthe buildings it contains…but you need to watch your aim before you hit someone who isn't as…understanding…"

'Z' gave a toothy, pointy grin.

"Oh, you can lighten up a little; I'll admit that was kind of fun. That human over there probably won't agree, but it's good to get the blood pumping every now and then. So, you were conducting field tests of the NEO cannon using these old buildings as target practice?"

"Um…yes, Mettaton's a TV show host and entertainer, but we've been working on a variety of attachments to make the most of his modular design. The most exciting one so far is the NEO cannon, I guess. How'd we do?"

"Eighty-three-point five percent accuracy, Dr. Alphys. By my calculations, we'll reach 90% in only two weeks' time."

"Huh. Earth kids love action movies too, don't they?"

"Splendid idea!"

"Anyway…no one's lived here for years and no one wants to move back, so, why not? I mean, we've wanted to clear out this land for a long time and doing it this way feels…right. Like, getting back at them and showing what we can do. That's why we were out here, but what about you two?"

"I'm helping her find her daughter. Have either of you seen a young girl, by any chance? Early teens, about five feet, brown ponytail? Wears glasses? Jeans, jacket, boots? Carries a journal with lots and lots of animal sketches?"

"No, sorry…wait! I did find this page, though. It was buried under a pile of scrap metal. Looks like…a footprint drawing…and some handwritten notes."

Rockefeller grabbed the paper and held it up to her face as if it was a sweet-smelling flower.

"That's her handwriting! And her style! So, now we know Ellie definitely made it here, right?"

"Hmm…"

"Right?"

"Oh, um…yes, that's right. Can I see that?"

The lawyer passed 'Z' the drawing, which she perused for two seconds before plastering it onto the ground and setting her foot down beside it.

"Look."

The three-toed footprint strikingly resembled 'Z's left foot but scaled down to four-fifths in all dimensions.

"But…how? There's no way my Ellie could have possibly known how to draw that!"

"That's a good point. The barrier was still standing and my group's perfect when it comes to not leaving tracks…"

"Then what did Ellie see here? Was this one just her imagination?"

"Tracks…"

"Tracks? Did Ellie get onto a train?"

" _But one of us did leave tracks_."

"What? What are you talking about?"

"Random theory: on the day we learned of the society of Earth monsters, Prince Asriel carried Chara to the center of the village. The moment he stepped out into the sunlight, his smaller feet left a trail in the dirt; then, the um, earthquake hit, and the fires baked them into the Earth like fossils. They would have easily survived a few years…anyone who followed them would have been led straight toward the mountain. Ellie clearly took great interest in these unusual paw-prints, and you said she isn't the type to pass up an adventure."

"Doctor Scientist Monster! What's the quickest way into the Monster Kingdom?"

Alphys gestured toward the west side of Mount Ebott, urgently explaining, "Over there's a trail that leads up the mountain and into a big cavern. If you hike all the way to the end of the cave, there's a big drop that will take you directly into the Underground."

"Lawyer, astronaut, _and_ spelunker…what a marvelous story you'll have for your daughter. Well, let's go!"


	37. Perseverance

Frisk 20 AT ? DF

*HP: 20/20

* * *

"It is with great pleasure that I hereby send away our hominid friend with a clean bill of health. No lollies though. I'm afraid I haven't much taste for those."

"Aww. Then how about one of these? Or one of those? What about this thing?"

Still expecting a prize, the human darted around the lab and helped herself to various intricate-looking scientific instruments. Gaster chased behind her, carefully removing and replacing a conga line of objects from Frisk's hands while repeatedly muttering "Don't touch that" each time another item was picked up. Frisk definitely had energy; all the more reason to conclude that the artifact hadn't permanently harmed her.

"Good thing the effects were temporary; the queen would _kill_ me if only ninety-five percent of her child came home to the dinner table."

The alien paced chin-in-paw around the lab tables, examining the instruments for himself before stopping in front of a large bank of glass monitors. Their resolution was not exceptional, but he recognized a few places—the snow white of Snowdin, mesmerizing fluorescent caves, and endless volcanic oceans.

"Cameras?"

"Dr. Alphys's idea. She figured that a comprehensive surveillance system would facilitate the Royal Guard's duties."

"Is the artifact covered?"

"Absolutely. In fact, all Waterfall cameras have recently been outfitted with both infrared and ultraviolet sensors. Anyone who has even existed for a second in those caves—human or monster, magical or otherwise—was recorded."

"…anyone?" the alien replied, blushing for no discernible reason.

"Um, yes. Anyone. Anything you did in the caves—even if you were to hide your heat signature, the UV would still detect you."

Luna started typing furiously on the console, claws click-clacking against the plastic keys in a desperate search for something he'd rather keep buried in a mountain of footage. Accidentally, a clip of him losing a fight against the great Ruins door appeared on the display, but seeing that mishap again didn't fluster him in the slightest. He kept searching, causing several more clips to appear on top of one another like a cascade of popup ads. The last and front-most one showed a monster with a ribbon and a human in a suit walking into the snow.

Gaster approached the monitor, pointing at the video, and pointed out, "Wait. That feed is live. What business does that lawyer have here?"

Everyone gathered around the console, huddled and hunkered down as if they were tracking a deer through a forest. The monster and human seemed to be talking to each other, one of them describing something with a series of hand gestures and the other taking notes in an electronic notepad.

The monster stopped writing and turned toward the camera, squinting directly at the group of snooping eyes. An electric flash filled the screen, feed blacking out and then rebooting as static.

"Doesn't like being watched?"

"Guess not. That's our cue to get down there ourselves."

"There is a gondola that will ferry us from Hotland to Snowdin in a moment's notice. Your friend did a number on that camera, though; I'll see if anything needs repairs here and then travel to Snowdin myself."

"Right. Sorry. We'll reimburse you for that."

"In the meantime, I will be closing up for the day soon; your Highness, now would be a good time to take those two home."

Asriel went out the lab with his two accomplices and started for New Home, but immediately took off in the opposite direction.

* * *

"And you're absolutely sure that Ellie isn't in the Ruins?"

"It was like a garbage heap. I don't think _anyone_ wants to stay in the Ruins. Furthermore, there was no trace of her—no journal, no glasses, no torn clothes—nothing to suggest Ellie didn't make it out of there."

Before Rockefeller could reply, something warm brushed against her shoulder. She flinched and let out a small yelp, but to her side was a familiar face. Heart rate slowly returning to double digits, the lawyer raised a finger and panted, "Why…"

"Just wanted to remind you that you're, as your clients would say, 'walking on our turf now'. No, actually, I'm just teasing; at first, I wanted to sneak up on 'Z' but she would have seen me in the snow. You and your paranoid self and that camera should get a room; I heard there's a few in this village."

One of the goat monsters playfully punched the other in the arm.

"I had a perfectly good, non-paranoid reason for doing that. It was Mrs. Rockefeller, you see, I was merely worried about the possible damage to her professional reputation if proof of her fraternizing with us leaked onto the surface. We have standards, fluffybutt. One out-of-context scene; a wrong impression, and they'd try to hire us to find every cheating spouse between here and the Moon."

"Those cameras are a secure network protecting the artifact, not to mention that Dr. Gaster lives in the same building as the console. This ship is airtight, 'fluffybutt'…now, what brings you two here? I thought the investigation into Mrs. Rockefeller's daughter was still in progress."

"Why don't you answer that? Why were we led _here_ during the investigation?"

Luna looked surprised.

"Oh. You don't think that Rockefeller Jr. fell into the Underground too?"

"It's clearly not impossible if those two managed...perhaps the local law enforcement has some information for us."

The trio carefully stepped around an oversized barricade of wooden logs, taking in a whiff of fresh pine while avoiding a nasty fall into an endless abyss.

(Yikes…that bridge didn't even have handrails! Isn't that a little unsafe?)

(Remind me to mention that to the townsfolk later.)

Rockefeller saw a human silhouette moving around a nearby sentry booth; flagging down the figure, she started, "Excuse me, could you point me to the nearest police station? It's about a missing child."

"Police station? You must mean the Royal Guard! The Great Papyrus, Royal Guard Extraordinaire and Assistant Deputy Captain at your service. Allow me to help you, human!"

The lawyer mentally shuffled through greetings, trying to determine the most appropriate etiquette for her unusual locale. An awkward bow won out, followed by a typical warm handshake from the skeleton.

"Okay, captain, thank you. Could you tell me if you or the other guards have seen my daughter? She's about _this_ tall, long brown hair, glasses, possibly carrying a little notebook?"

"Why, yes…I remember. She was one of the humans we tried to capture."

"... _capture?_ "

"Yes. King Asgore asked us to capture any humans that come through. I tried my best, but she defeated each and every one of my puzzles; a worthy foe, indeed! But Undyne's one of the greatest Guards; she probably picked her up in Waterfall!"

" _…capture?!_ Where is Ellie now? I'm an attorney; you can't hold her like this. Let her go at once!"

"Straight to the top, Rocky. If anyone knows what transpired, it's the king."

'Z' took off running towards an icy riverbank, beckoning the other two to follow her with a single claw.

* * *

For a thin, wooden vessel with an unhydrodynamic dog figurehead, the gondola offered rides smooth enough to make a cozy mattress jealous. All was quiet except for the occasional droplet of water dripping from the cavern walls. The river flowed endlessly by, hooded navigator standing stoic against the cool air, and none of the passengers seemed much for conversation. The lawyer and minister were enjoying every minute of having a seat to rest their tired legs, but the field commander looked almost seasick.

(Hey. How are you feeling?)

(Fine.)

(No, you aren't.)

(…)

(I know you've grown close to the royal family. Don't misunderstand me; it isn't that we're _not allowed_ to keep acquaintances in our line of work, but you must realize the gravity of our being here.)

Luna nodded sadly.

(The barrier was still active. That's a fact. Best case scenario is that Ellie obtained a monster's SOUL somehow and escaped. Then, we'll simply have some more walking to do.)

(Rockefeller isn't saying anything; I think deep down she's hoping for the best.)

(Worst case scenario…well…)

(I think I'm actually going to be sick…)

'Z' shifted herself toward her counterpart and started rubbing his shoulder gently.

(You've helped to maintain peace between us and them thus far. Taking the time to learn about and listen to this place's problems is a resourceful move, not to mention plain admirable.)

Luna buried his head in his paws.

(But your job only demanded one of those things. When we arrive at the Dreemurrs' house…whatever we find there…we can control what information is leaked to the media but we can't hide the results from the Bureau itself. I won't force you to investigate them if you wish not to.)

* * *

"Seriously? _None_ of these lava pools are cordoned off by guardrails?"

Luna shrugged, claiming, "I don't understand them either, but no one ever seems to fall in."

The three found their way to a familiar wooden door; only, knocking on it felt no more familiar than knocking on a stranger's for the first time.

"Hello? Your Highnesses? Are you home?"

The door creaked open. Luna waved inside and the inside waved back. Toriel's voice answered, "Yes? What can we do for you…and…Mrs. Rockefeller?"

"Never thought I'd see you again. Do you have my Ellie? Where is she?"

"Um…we're looking for her missing daughter. A thirteen-year-old, looks like a smaller version of her, glasses, notebook, et cetera…Anyway, we have a statement from the Royal Guard's deputy captain placing her here."

Toriel froze.

"Hmm? Is there something you know that we should know?"

Another voice from inside the house responded, "Tori, who is that?"

"Can we come in?"

"Yes, of course."

Everyone, trio and Dreemurr family save for Chara's scientist brother, gathered in the living room around a chair and dining table. The fireplace was extinguished. 'Z' was strolling around the table, voice randomly and suddenly appearing behind each human or monster as she floated around the chairs.

"We've quite literally travelled the stars in search of this child. We're tired of looking now. The royal guardsman we questioned claimed that Ellie was taken here. Two possibilities: either that monster was lying or you are all hiding something from us, and that monster doesn't strike me as the deceitful sort."

Nobody said anything. The Dreemurr parents looked uncomfortable. Their kids were downright terrified.

"Where is Ellie?"

Silence again. 'Z' felt her heart boiling under the impatience.

"Is she in here? The CORE? In a cell in the lab like a test monkey?"

Silence.

"Okay, then. Come along, Luna, it seems they don't know either."

'Z' started toward the door, but the moment she got a foot out into the foyer, there was a rapid purple flash and a loud thump. The scowling goat monster had reappeared in front the table and slammed a paw onto the wooden finish as the next stage of her psychological campaign.

"Do you all think this is some kind of joke? We aren't here on a leisure visit; bring us Ellie now or we'll find her ourselves."

(Is this really necessary?)

(Quiet, Luna.)

A deep voice replied, "I can't."

"You can't? Why not?"

"I can't tell you."

Asgore's scrunched-up face looked like it was in dire need of an aspirin.

"I see…"

'Z's glare cooled from icy to absolute zero as she reappeared behind the king, head just above his right ear.

"There's nothing to bring us, is there?"

It took a great effort on the king's part to shake his head "no."

"I'm sorry, Rocky…"

(No…there has to be an explanation…)

Something within the lawyer shattered; she crumbled against the table and let out a muffled wail of the depth and emotion only a mother could muster.

"You had her killed, didn't you? Just as the royal guardsman said?"

(There's no way they did this. I trust them.)

The fur on the queen's neck stood up, electric charge building up like water pushing against a cracked dam. A white light began to glow from her chest, as if being led out by Zephyr into the light of day.

"But we know who the real brains of the Monster Kingdom are, don't we? I can see the mark on your finger, your Highness, you left your husband after he carried out your plan to throw us off your trail, didn't you?"

(They're not street thugs, Zephyr, you don't have to…)

The charge and white light faded and a tingling sensation approached the prince's neck.

"Of course, we can't forget that Mom and Dad might be trying to protect their child…it was you who killed her, wasn't it? You and Chara knew that whoever struck back against the humans—your mortal enemies—would be hailed as heroes. So, you killed Ellie for the fame and glory and when Mom and Dad found out, they invented this convoluted human-capturing plan to hide your mistake."

"But…no…I…"

(This is insane, 'Z'! Stop this!)

"Give it up, your Highness. The proof's floating in front of your face."

There was a carousel of hearts in front of the prince: one white, one green, two blue, one orange, one yellow…and one purple. More soft footsteps surrounded the house and encroached on the living room from outside.

* * *

Blizz 95 AT 119 DF

Cryogen 78 AT 124 DF

*Volunteer firefighters.

* * *

"Come along, Asriel. We have a few more questions for you."

'Z' reached for the child, but her paw was stopped in midair by a crystalline barrier. It wasn't the prince's doing nor his parents; rather, the human SOULs she had drawn out were shielding their host with a magical force field.

 _"Now see here, partner; I don't appreciate you walking up to our friend all coyote-like."_

 _"Can you not see that you are scaring him?"_

 _"You wanna do something to the prince, you'll have to deal with us too."_

 _"Hey! Purple! Anything you want to say to the mean goat lady?"_

Everyone, except for a slightly embarrassed 'Z', turned toward the floating amethyst heart. The others seemed to be encouraging the Perseverance SOUL to lead the group with another witty comeback, but it remained telepathically silent.

 _"Purple? You there? Maybe don't stay up all night reading next time?"_

 _"…mommy?"_

The lawyer's eyes widened.

"Ellie? Is that you? Where are you?"

The purple SOUL was doing the armless, legless equivalent of waving and jumping in the air.

 _"Mom! I'm here! I'm right here!"_

"But…where's my daughter? Where's the child I raised with my own two hands?"

 _"What are you talking about, Mom? I'm right in front of you!"_

The purple heart reached out with a glowing aura, but Rockefeller jerked away as if it was a crime scene body.

"No…but…you're just a floating heart! It's a trick, it has to be! Where's Ellie?"

 _"I'm Ellie! It's me, your daughter!"_

"No, you aren't! You're just a magic…thing…with her voice! Why'd you do this to me, Fluffy? Is giving me all that hope some kind of cruel payback for what I did to your friends?"

Rockefeller was in tears and shaking 'Z' by her shoulders, and the purple SOUL would do the same if it had tear ducts. As the other SOULs crowded around their hurting counterpart, 'Z' wrapped a paw around the despairing lawyer and whispered, "Ellie…magic doesn't work that way. Monsters can't fake human SOULs. Not only is that 'floating heart' most definitely your daughter, she's also someone who really needs her mother right this very second."

The lawyer sniffled and bolted toward her lost child, clutching the SOUL to her own in a tearful embrace.

"Oh, Ellie, I'm so sorry! After all these years…I didn't know what happened to you; if you were even still alive! What kind of mother am I, to turn away at her own child like that?"

 _"No, Mom, I'm sorry! I saw these cool paw prints and…I knew it wasn't safe sneaking away from the others…but I just had to see where they led. There was a beautiful cave and I climbed in to look around, but then I tripped and…and…it's all my fault!"_

"Shh…no, it's mine…I never stopped looking for you, but after the first 48 hours…the police said they couldn't devote any more resources. Why, oh why, couldn't I convince them to keep searching?"

 _"But…everything's okay now, right? We're finally together again thanks to the goat lady, aren't we?"_

"Yes, Ellie, everything's going to be all right now. But the things the goat lady said…human SOULs…if this is truly you, what happened to your body? Did…did you _die_?"

 _"I…"_

Several of the monsters nonchalantly and sorrowfully turned their heads away. The facts were clear; Ellie's SOUL had no corresponding body in sight.

"Forgive me, Rocky, I didn't want you to bring you down here just to tell you bad news, but she's, um…it's complicated."

The most unexpected and seemingly impossible of all the answers that could have come out of 'Z's mouth, and it frustrated Rockefeller as much.

"What do you mean, 'it's complicated', Fluffy? She's either alive or dead, and she's dead, isn't she?! Just say it so I can get it over with!"

"Well…yes. And no. The Ellie who sat on the couch and watched TV with you is likely gone, according to all standards of forensic science. The Ellie who shared her dreams with you; who asked you for help with her homework and remembered your favorite crime drama to get you the perfect gift and counted on you to make even the worst days better, is resting in your hands and living on as a symbiote through the prince's body."

"So, you mean…she's really…"

"I don't know, Rocky. I really don't know. We haven't seen this sort of thing before either. Who Ellie was is still very much alive, but she can't survive outside of the host she's chosen. I can tell you'd like an expert opinion from me, but…all I can tell you is that you need to decide for yourself."

Biology and philosophy aside, the implications of Ellie's condition were clear. Rockefeller would not be leaving the Monster Kingdom with her long-lost daughter. Nevertheless, she could still help her to the best of her abilities.

"What happened to you, Ellie? Who did this to you?"

 _"I…it's all a blur…I can't…"_

The lawyer kicked herself for her directness. She had seen firsthand how emotional questioning victims could get, and those were the ones who _survived_ to tell their tales.

"It's okay, sweetie, you don't have to remember everything for me if you don't want to, but…do you think we could start with one little detail?"

 _"Okay…I'll try…"_

"Did you feel cold?"

 _"Um…yeah…it was cold…and wet…and then I felt trapped. Like I was in a small space. There were others near me…five, I think."_

"You're doing great so far, Ellie. Those five: were they humans or monsters?"

 _"I saw…floating SOULs…they were colorful like a rainbow…I remember now…I was floating around in a glass cylinder. It was dark, but I saw three more next to me in their own tanks. All I felt was how much I missed you…it was so lonely…but then those three introduced themselves and we passed the time by talking to each other about everything you could imagine. We learned the monsters' side of the story and, as the days passed, two more joined us in the darkness."_

"Well…uh…glad to see you're making friends here!"

 _"Oh, Mom…"_

"What?"

 _"That…it's just such a mom thing to say!"_

The two shared a much-needed laugh, not only as family, but as friends reunited.

 _"And one day, someone carried us out of the dark into a bright hallway. They left in a hurry, but then Asriel and Chara walked in and we all started shouting as loud as we could. You should have seen it, Mom, he was so startled he fell over on his tail!"_

"And then you asked him to...absorb all of you?"

 _"Yeah. We had a big discussion between ourselves and we were getting bored, and we agreed it was time to destroy the barrier…and…now we're all here."_

"Wow, and here I thought _I'd_ surprise you with my astronaut-spelunker story!"

 _"Astronaut? You went to space, Mom? Me too!"_

"Wait, what do you mean by 'me too'?"

 _"It's another long story…"_

'Z' whispered something into her partner's ear. Luna nodded and whispered something back. One of them asked, "Ellie, dear, do you remember who carried the canisters out into the hallway?"

 _"Of course! It was King Asgore! He's sitting right there at the table!"_

(Motive, location, suspect, and victim, Luna. Are you ready?)

(No.)

"I see. In that case, your Highness, we'd like you to answer a few more questions under suspicion of the first-degree murder of Ellie Rockefeller, along with five additional murders of five currently unidentified human children."

The queen, visibly exhausted despite not having moved in the previous few minutes, shot up from her seat and shouted, "That can't be! There is no way my Gorey could ever hurt a child like that! No…it isn't true! I won't believe it!"

"…right?"

"Tori…we needed human SOULs to break the barrier. When I asked the Royal Guard to bring me seven humans, I didn't think there was any other way."

"But…why?"

"We were not the only ones hurt by our son and daughter, Tori. Our subjects needed hope; someone with a plan to carry them into the light of day. Now that that day has come, it is only appropriate for me to carry the blame for all of us."

"But…but…you can't take him! Our kids need their father!"

"Come along, your Highness; we can work something out to reward cooperation. Don't make this any more difficult for your family."

'Z's colleagues didn't need to move; Asgore approached them willingly.

"Wait!"

"Wait!"

Rockefeller bolted out of her seat to join the already-standing queen, sharing an awkward, heart-rending glance with each other upon hearing the other's voice.

"Rocky…he killed your daughter…don't you want justice for her after all these years? Our search is finally over! He's literally right there!"

"Fluffy…I can't thank you enough for helping me…but I have a little confession to make too."

"Of course. Take all the time you need."

"Up above, we have legends about this place. 'People who climb this mountain never return' and ghost stories like that. When the police couldn't find Ellie after she disappeared during a field trip near that mountain…a part of me already knew what had happened to her."

"Mrs. Rockefeller…"

"I bawled like a baby for weeks, Fluffy. I couldn't show my face around the office, let alone leave my house without seeing her running up the driveway from the school bus. Every day felt like another ninety thousand seconds spent waiting for something that would never come. I didn't understand what to live for anymore."

"Rocky…stop…"

"I was going through Ellie's room one day when I stumbled upon an old photo album. As much as it hurt, I started flipping through the pictures…maybe…just maybe I could understand why this happened to her; how I could have failed as her mother…"

'Z' sniffled but would never admit anything else to her partner.

"But then, I found a photo I took of Ellie on Take Your Child to Work Day. She was five and Thompson let her sit behind the judge's bench and play with the gavel…and she was so happy…I don't think I'd ever seen her so ecstatic at any other time. I realized just how much she looked up to me, the superpower-less superhero who could rescue an innocent person no matter how dire the odds looked. The next day was the day I returned to the courtroom; to keep fighting against a system that would rather bury defendants in plea deals than give them a fair fight; to defend our rights and freedoms when nobody else will, and to make sure that no family would ever be ripped apart by the law again. I've had years to move on, Fluffy; I'm sorry for dragging you all over the solar system…but…now that we're here, I think what I was truly after was closure…and for you to bring me so much more than that, thank you, from the bottom of my heart. But now…I think I know what Ellie would want me to do."

Behind the tired eye emerged a familiar combative spark.

"Tell your two agents to release Mr. Dreemurr at once. That confession reeked of coercion and I know you've found no other physical evidence to justify holding him."

"Now who's playing the cruel joke? This is for Ellie's sake, Rocky! Are you discrediting your own daughter's recollections?"

"I'm a defender, Fluffy. You may believe that we help people get away with murder, but our duty is to ensure that an _exhaustive investigation_ leads to the _right person_ getting a _fair sentence_. Believe me, nobody wants justice for Ellie more than I do, but if you want to bring Murder One to the table, you'd better be ready to do it right."

"Even if the confession is inadmissible, the witness slash victim still creates reasonable suspicion. Plus, we have the barrier as motive and an absorbed SOUL as proof of victim. What more do you want?"

"What about an actual crime scene? Or an autopsy? Or an actual murder weapon? None of what you've gathered so far specifically identifies Mr. Dreemurr as Ellie's murderer."

 _"Yeah! Heck, I'm still here, so how could you possibly charge Mister Asgore with murder?"_

Luna's partner shot a disbelieving look at Ellie's SOUL. She had a point; the victim wasn't nearly as 'dead' as most murder victims.

"If you want to interrogate his Highness, then go out and establish probable cause first."


	38. Pertinacity

(Humans, Luna, I swear; if there's a limit to their weirdness, I'll wear a dorky scarf until the next Earth year.)

(Aren't we all a little weird?)

(You know we can't exactly disagree from our positions…but still…child abusers, her own daughter's murderer…how? Why? Do you think she's sniping us for ruining her day in court?)

(She wasn't upset when we ran into her after the verdict; actually, she was borderline apologetic.)

(Hmm. I might have a theory. Rockefeller didn't confide this in me specifically, but she must be aware that her daughter can't leave Asriel. The Dreemurrs clearly aren't posting their son for adoption anytime soon, so what else could she do?)

(You're proposing that this is all the lawyer's coping strategy? By opposing every facet of our investigation, she's able to stay with her daughter for longer?)

(I think she _likes_ the thrill of the insurmountable fight...and if it helps her daughter in the process, why not? Wouldn't you do the same for your kid?)

(Absolutely.)

(We'll play along. Proceed with the investigation. Play by her rules. Give her a battle to remember. She's happy, Bureau's happy, everyone's happy.)

( _They_ aren't…)

(Luna…)

(I've tried to make peace with this ever since you busted that camera in Snowdin, but it's getting difficult. We're taking their dad and painting him as a dirty child killer right in front of his own family. You said it yourself: Toriel and Asgore could merely be protecting their children…and I promised them the same. It's all come down to this, isn't it? Gaining their trust just to backstab them in the end? Are we even sure Asgore's criminally liable?)

(Six children are dead. If he isn't liable, _someone_ is, but he's currently the most obvious suspect. Once again, fluffybutt, you aren't the only commander here. You can recuse yourself. Let me handle all the un-pleasantries; that way, you won't have to betray anybody.)

(No. You're right. Someone has to be responsible. I hope they'll understand.)

'Z' broke off from her two-person huddle with her partner, eyeing the king and his unofficial counsel from across the dinner table. They were whispering to each other and to Toriel and to the children, undoubtedly rehearsing answers, reviewing rights of accused, and reassuring that no trouble would befall Asriel and his two accomplices if they stayed out of the way. Then, Toriel whispered something else and shooed the three outside to play.

A brief concern involving their reputation for stirring the pot and compromised evidence entered the ribboned goat monster's mind, but a glare from her counterpart implicitly shouting, "Really?" dispelled that thought immediately. Physically and mentally composed, 'Z' began, "So be it, Rockefeller. Since the suspect has so graciously invited us into his home, let's begin with a search of the premises. Your Highnesses, would you two be so kind as to let us take a look around? You've nothing to fear if you've done nothing wrong."

The king and queen glanced at each other and responded, "No."

"You wouldn't want your kids to watch us rifle through their things, would you? I promise, if you let us look around, we'll be out of your hair within an hour and we won't return later today. You'll have time to eat dinner with them and read them a bedtime story or whatever you all usually do."

"No."

The defender had coached them well.

"Without a warrant, Fluffy? Don't tell me you believed it would be so easy."

Zephyr slowly walked around the dining room again, carefully scanning for the slightest incriminating detail that could override the need for a judicial writ. She passed by the table; it was an ordinary wooden furniture set decorated with a potted golden flower. Nothing unusual in the kitchen, either; in fact, between the hanging pots and pans and utensils was not a single knife. The chair looked comfortable, but cozying up to a warm fire with a good book hardly qualified as criminal activity. By now, the goat monster had circumambulated the room with no fruit to show for her foraging efforts. In a final gambit, she squinted and peered down the long hallway on the other side of the foyer. A perfectly polished mirror adorned the far-left wall; in front, three doors punctuated by simple wall-mounted light fixtures and dressers topped with more golden flower pots.

The nearest door was relatively worn at its hinges; in other words, it belonged to three children continuously leaving and entering their bedroom. The farthest door was in better condition, but had a slightly larger knob than the other two; therefore, it accommodated the paws of two fully-grown Boss Monsters. The middle door, in near-pristine condition, was padlocked and guarded by a "Renovations" sign.

"What's behind Door Number Two, Dreemurr?"

Immediately and reflexively, the lawyer fired back, "Don't answer that."

'Z' grinned, pointing enthusiastically at the locked door as if she had discovered a unicorn riding a flying pig.

"Plain view doctrine, Rocky. According to Ellie's account, her SOUL canister was withdrawn from a small, unlit room and placed into a hallway. Furthermore, Asriel previously revealed to my partner that he encountered the human SOULs in _that_ very hallway. It's not a stretch to conclude that the SOUL canisters were kept in the padlocked room; since they played a significant role in the sextuple murder, we have the right to search that room without a warrant."

"Drat!"

The two accompanying agents, icy trails emanating from their paws, approached the locked door and froze the padlock with their chilling magic. Displaying all the delicacy and grace expected of typical searching-and-seizing detectives, the duo shattered the lock with an ice pick-like weapon and forced the second door open. Recoiling from the sound of glass breaking, Luna apologized profusely for his colleagues' roughness and joined them in inspecting the off-limits room.

He regretted stepping foot into the darkness immediately. As his partner illumined the area with a floating electric orb, broken cylindrical shapes came out of the shadows and glass shards surrounded their feet.

"The broken SOUL canisters…he must have been in a hurry to hide them after the barrier was destroyed."

'Z' summoned a second sphere and sent it floating slowly through the air until it reached the end of the rectangular space. The additional light revealed a truly disturbing sight: between the investigators and the far wall lay seven coffins in a row, heads backed against the left wall and feet forming a perfect line soldiers would be proud of. Fearing the worst, they carefully placed their paws on the morbid receptacles and gently pried the lids away. No training would ever prepare them for a half-dozen messes in states of decomposition and levels of goriness limited only by the darkest corners of their imaginations. The goat monsters held their breaths and suppressed gags long enough to peer inside the caskets, only to unfortunately (or fortunately) find not a single trace of biological matter within any of them.

"That's it. Having exactly seven of these around…one for each of seven human SOULs…that establishes premeditation even if we couldn't recover any bodies."

After a few minutes spent meticulously photographing the non-existent skeletons in Asgore's closet, the team of detectives returned to the table with their newly discovered cache of arms.

"Would you care to share what you've learned snooping in people's private property?"

"The king keeps enough coffins to run a morgue out of business. Thinking of getting into the mortuary business yourself, 'Gorey'?"

Toriel gasped and hid behind a paw over her mouth. Asgore looked as troubled as he'd been for the entire day.

"Words fail to describe how badly this reflects upon you, your Highness, and your lawyer realizes it too. These coffins conclusively link you to the murders, you know. They show just how long you've been planning this…this _massacre_ for. More to the point, they provide us grounds to question you for a long time."

Zephyr motioned toward the two cryomancers and began to articulate the order, but stopped herself upon seeing her partner's pained face. The Dreemurrs were the counter-example of flight risks; perhaps, a moment of mercy could be spared for everyone's sake.

"But, that wouldn't be very sporting of us. Enjoy the rest of your day. We'll be having a little chat tomorrow."

As the detectives finally left for the day, Luna glanced at Toriel with a longing, apologetic, borderline-begging-for-understanding expression. She returned eye contact for a second, but just as quickly looked away without a single word.

* * *

"You could have given me a heads-up before sharing a room together, by the way."

"They're two hundred ancient solid gold coins each and Chara's firestorm of a brother burned away the rest of the money I came across. Believe me, we'd be chasing down a robber if we didn't have our paws full of this murder."

Luna picked up the plastic comb his partner flustered out of his paws, returning to the mirror to pick bits of ash out of the fur coating his blushing face. He moved closer to the glass to nick a particularly troublesome black particle from his cheek, taking note at the finely crafted golden trim framing his reflection. Behind him was a luxurious bed, dimensions easily the size of a minivan, with scarlet, puffy covers neatly tucked under the memory foam mattress. On either side of the bed was a Mettaton-shaped lamp on top of a Mettaton-shaped nightstand. A warm, orange light emanated from one of the fixtures, providing just enough ambience for the other commander to fill paperwork on her electronic device.

Talking to 'Z's reflection, Luna continued, "Those coffins never bore the weight of dead bodies. Rockefeller will have no trouble dismissing them tomorrow; she might even use their flawless condition to argue that Asgore never even came near the victims."

"A small setback. That simply means our perpetrator dumped the bodies somewhere. If our victims never made it to the coffins, that means some part of the plan must have gone awry. That's a weak point waiting to be discovered."

"The Underground is larger than it seems, 'Z'. A brisk walk straight from the Ruins to the Barrier takes hours, and there are countless branching tunnels I'm not even aware of."

"Then we'll press him for the locations of the bodies."

"He won't divulge that information because he's still protecting his family, and especially not while the lawyer's sitting next to him."

'Z' didn't respond immediately. Instead, the sound of the mattress decompressing itself followed by nearly imperceptible footsteps against the checkered carpet poked at Luna's ears.

"Don't forget that this is no ordinary murder, Luna. We still have an ace—actually, six of them. The other victims' SOULs are perfectly capable of talking to us about their experiences after falling in and Rockefeller has no power to keep them silent as she'll probably request of Asgore and Ellie."

The voice originated from centimeters away rather than a room's length. Continuing, she whispered softly, "This is only going to get uglier tomorrow. Sure you're still okay with this?"

Luna stared deeply into the mirror. It stared back deeper.

"The queen looked like she wanted nothing to do with me ever again. I…I think it's already too late to turn back."

A fluffy hug from behind.

"You stuck with our side. I know it must have been a difficult choice, but loyalty isn't something to be taken lightly. When this is all over, we'll help you make it right, okay?"

It was getting late. Taking a nap during questioning would be poor form.

The two goat monsters turned around. There was one bed. There was one pillow barely large enough to accommodate one tired head.

* * *

"Nightmares?"

"I almost have the exact measurements of that moonlit street memorized. Still, it's nice to have someone watch your back."

"You'd better appreciate it, fluffybutt…you hogged that pillow all night!"

"And when the sun rose, you were curled up entirely on top of me like eleven cranked-up heated blankets. It's an absolute miracle I didn't wake up as a puddle."

One of the commanders poked the other in the muzzle, and then ran up to the Dreemurrs' doorstep. When the other caught up, the duo showed themselves inside and joined the _entire_ Dreemurr family and their counsel at their dinner table. In the middle stood a tea kettle and a dozen teacups.

"I suppose this hardly meets any of your preconceived notions of an interrogation. The locale is different, and technically speaking, there are about ten more of you here than is typical. We've no intention of psychologically torturing each of you in separate darkrooms until you break down and turn against one another; honestly, we just want to understand what transpired behind the barrier. Same rules apply, of course: the accused is protected from self-incrimination but deliberately mislead us and you'll be sorry. You're also entitled to an attorney but clearly, you're ahead in the game, so let's cut to the chase. Do you understand these rights as we've explained them?"

Compared with yesterday, the goat detective had backed off considerably. Perhaps this was her way of helping smooth over the rocks between her partner and the royal family; on the other hand, a change in strategy could progress the fact-finding in ways intimidation could not.

"Yes."

"Very well then. We have clear and convincing evidence that there existed a plot to collect human SOULs to the effect of using them against the barrier. First question, your Highness: do you deny that it was you who devised and ordered this plot carried out by the Royal Guard?"

The lawyer whispered something into the king's ear.

"No."

Neither avoiding the question nor ceding more ground than necessary.

"Can you describe this plot to us?"

"I could not bear the sight of our son and daughter recovering from their injuries; to know that the humans came so close to taking them away from us. In a fit of anger, I declared war on humanity and ordered that the SOUL of any fallen human be brought to me. According to the Royal Scientist, seven human SOULs would contain enough magical energy to destroy the barrier."

Rockefeller took a sip. 'Z' took a slightly condescending head shake.

"You cannot hold my client responsible under any legal code simply for renewing the war."

"We weren't going to. To continue, your Highness: were you aware of the implications of collecting SOULs; in other words, that your plan would could only be fulfilled by killing seven humans?"

"Objection."

"This isn't a court, Rocky."

"Still, isn't it true that the only condition to absorb a SOUL is that its owner dies?"

"Yes. That's what I just asked."

"Not quite. You said a moment ago that one had to _kill_ to obtain a SOUL, and now you've just acknowledged that _dying_ is the prerequisite. There's a big difference, Fluffy, so, which is it?"

'Fluffy' folded her fingers.

"To my understanding, if someone dies, there is a window of time in which their SOUL may be absorbed."

"I see. Therefore, you must also acknowledge the possibility, albeit a sad one, that these six children perished by natural causes? If that is the truth, the Guard members could have simply collected the SOULs they left behind without ever laying a finger or claw on them."

'Z' took a sip. Rockefeller took an accusatorily-pointed finger.

"Are you seriously going for the 'Anta cut himself' defense again?"

"I'm simply doing my job, Fluffy."

'Z' had no choice but to withdraw. Meanwhile, she noticed that Toriel and Asriel seemed both surprised and distressed, more so than expected from a sweating perpetrator under the hot lamp even though they weren't the accused at all. Asgore had gone so far as to confess in front of high-ranking agents to protect his family; hiding a deadly secret was hardly a stretch.

"Did he not inform you of his plan?"

The queen admitted, "I thought renewing the war would put our children in danger again. After trying for days to convince him to reconsider, I… fled from New Home to live in the Ruins. It was very rash of me…but…I believed if I kept humans from entering the Underground, he would eventually give up. I tried; how I tried to stop them, but…I just couldn't save them…"

Toriel suddenly reached out to hug the three children, mumbling between tears, "And…and the worst part is…I abandoned you three…my own babies! What…kind of…horrible mother…am I?"

Luna wanted nothing more in that moment than to console her and reassure her that everyone made mistakes, but he couldn't yet. Rockefeller would have immediately claimed that her ex too made a mistake, immediately compromising his investigation's claim of premeditation.

(Go ahead, Luna. Something in the lawyer's eyes tells me that she's prepared to overturn premeditation anyway.)

The goat detective lightly touched Toriel's arm and spoke softly, "You made a mistake, your Highness. Everyone does, but I know it really hurt them when you did. Why don't we take a short break so you can talk with them?"

* * *

"Your Highness, what happened after Toriel left?"

"I realized she was right. I made a foolish choice that cost our children their mother. The next day, I walked to the Guard Captain's house to rescind the order, but…I couldn't. Every monster I talked with along the way told me how excited they were that they would soon be free; that they would finally be able to see the sun again. I just couldn't take their hopes away from them, so I decided not to mention my misgivings to the Guard. Instead, I asked them to also keep Chara and Asriel away from any humans that did fall down. They kept them out of harm's way whenever they stepped out of our house and I hid away the SOULs in that locked room when they came home."

"But that all changed when the sixth SOUL had been collected, didn't it?"

"I wanted to keep the canisters hidden until all seven were ready, but one day, I forgot to put them away before Chara and Asriel returned. I…lied to them and said that those six SOULs were of humans who had perished exploring Mount Ebott."

"...I messed it all up, didn't I…"

"No…Asriel…Chara…it's not your fault! It's all mine!"

Another tearful embrace, this time between the father and the children.

(We'll need another break, 'Z'.)

(Very well then. Let's step out for a few minutes; let them work out their personal matters.)

* * *

Rockefeller looked ready to pounce.

"At this point, you can't possibly claim intent on my client's part. It's obvious that the order was a moment-of-passion act to begin with, and it was an act he regretted almost immediately. It was a fickle political climate that prevented him from scrapping the plan, and when he couldn't, he tried his best to shield his children from any nasty repercussions."

"Fine. Six counts Man One subsequent to Kidnapping One. These are still very serious allegations, but at least they aren't murder. Six children are still dead as a direct result of your client's actions, Rocky, and no 'mistake' will ever excuse that."

"'Dead', Fluffy? Or murdered? Even now, you still can't prove where, how, or even if these murders took place."

'Z' took another sip.

"Well, then, why don't we ask your daughter to settle this for us?"

" _I'm really sorry…but…I remember falling in…and I remember being a heart-in-a-jar…but the stuff in between is a giant blur."_

"Do you have any idea who may have killed you? What did they look like?"

 _"I can't…! It was so…cold…and wet…"_

"Fluffy. Back off."

'Z' physically eased back in her chair, but leaned forward with her elbows on the table.

"Okay; it's okay…let's focus on what you do remember. You mentioned falling in, right?"

 _"Yeah. I followed some paw prints to the mountain and started exploring the trails. One of them led me to this cave…it was a little dark, but the rock formations were breathtaking. I climbed a little deeper, but…I guess I must have tripped on a ridge or something because the next thing I remember is falling. I don't know how long I was in the air for…I was scared and my eyes were closed. I landed in something soft, and when I opened my eyes again, I was lying on a bed of golden flowers in the middle of a giant cavern."_

"You're doing very well, Ellie," Luna remarked, looking up from a pile of scribbled notes, "Now we know for sure you've used that entrance. If you keep going, we can fill in the blanks you don't or don't want to remember without forcing you to relive them. Please, continue."

" _I couldn't move my body. Everything just…hurt…and for a second I thought for sure I was dead. I heard soft footsteps coming from the end of the cavern, so I reached out and…I think I mumbled 'Help', but I could barely hear my own voice."_

 _"My eyelids were getting heavy. I saw a big, white, furry blur, and just before I passed out, I heard a gentle voice say, 'Oh…you've…fallen down, haven't you?'"_

"Tori—err…Mrs. Dreemurr? Were you that white blur?"

"Yes. I was about to go water the flowers when I heard a terrible crash. It was the least I could do; I tended to her injuries and set her down on a bed to rest. Strange, isn't it? I never thought to ask Ellie for her name and now it's as if we're meeting all over again."

 _"I didn't get a chance to tell you this, Miss Toriel, but, um…thank you. You really saved me."_

"Saved," and yet, there Ellie floated as a disembodied heart. Toriel's smile was bittersweet at best.

"Still, my child…I only wish I could have done more for you. Perhaps, if I never let you walk out of that door, you would still be…alive…"

 _"It wasn't your fault. I told you I had a family up above I needed to get back to."_

(Break time?)

(Break time.)

* * *

An aromatic, freshly-baked pie joined the teapot. Naturally, the two goat detectives had to refuse the treat.

"What happened after you stepped into Snowdin Forest?"

 _"Pine trees…just so many pine trees. I didn't know they could grow so tall underground! I kept following the trail, all the way up to an oversized wooden fence, but a strange skeleton man suddenly jumped out from behind the logs. I screamed and ran off the trail into the woods, and, when I was sure he wasn't following me, I hiked my way to the town."_

"How did the townsfolk react? Did any of them seem particularly hostile?"

 _"I don't think they even realized I was a human and not a little monster. They let me hang around in the, um…'librarby' for a few hours while I read all about how magic worked. It's really cool, Mom, did you know the color and temperature of a fireball changes with the monster's emotional state?"_

Rockefeller smiled, replying, "Why, no. I did not!"

 _"How about that they use different kinds for cooking and staying warm than for fighting?"_

"Um, no. Why don't you tell me more about what you've learned later, when the detectives are done taking their statement?"

 _"Okay, well, I stayed so long in the library that I fell asleep at one of the tables. One of the monsters carried me to an inn, where they let me spend the night. I remembered that the books said the Barrier was the only way back to the surface, so I asked the innkeeper for directions to New Home and she pointed me toward Waterfall. She was a really nice bunny-looking monster; told me I didn't have to worry about paying for the room either."_

"What happened in Waterfall?"

 _"I remember…running…I remember because that was the only other time I ran after falling down."_

"Running? Were you being pursued?"

 _"I think so, but…but…I can't…why can't I remember?"_

"Shh…it's all right. We're done. You did a fantastic job, Ellie; your mother should be proud of you."

(The source of Ellie's stress is in Waterfall, and given how little of the luminous caverns she could describe, I'd bet whatever happened to her happened soon after she stepped in.)

(Do you remember Ellie's first coherent memory from when we questioned her yesterday, Zephyr? She said it was 'cold' and 'wet'. What if her strongest emotional recollection wasn't post-death, but from just before?)

(Then, that means…)

'Z' suddenly whipped out her advanced phone and, in an urgent tone, ordered, "Blizz? Cryo? We have a lead on one of the victims. Begin a canvas of the Waterfall caverns for a torn notebook starting from the western entrance and work your way towards the east. Pay special attention to large bodies of water…you'll need diving gear and wetsuits."

* * *

A few hours later, two goat monsters in wetsuits and goggles tucked above their foreheads knocked on the door. 'Z' took the sealed, clear bags from their paws and lay them onto the table as if auctioning off ancient treasures.

 _"That's my journal! And…my glasses!"_

"Fluffy! Where did they find those?"

'Z' motioned for the lawyer to follow her and her partner out of the dining room and far away from her daughter.

"At the bottom of a lake. They also found…human remains…in a state of _remarkable_ preservation, I'll add. Nine or ten years old, long brown hair…it's unquestionably Ellie in there. They didn't want to move the body without your permission. Transmission electron tomography indicated the presence of water in her lungs as well as fractures to her vertebral column. It's likely that, while being chased, Ellie fell from a tall bridge, splashed into the lake at a harrowing velocity, and, in her already weakened state, drowned subsequent to injuries sustained from the impact. If it's any consolation, from her account, it sounded…painless…"

Rockefeller nearly knocked the goat detective over as she wrapped her arms around her, mumbling, "Thank you…thank you for finding out what happened to my Ellie…"

* * *

"This is an improvement…I guess?"

"There is absolutely no way I'm asking the Bureau to foot a 200G hotel room when it didn't even have pillows for both of us. We didn't even get mints or anything!"

As interesting as multiple ecosystems and climate patterns all fitting underneath one mountain was, the quiet, white-capped peaks provided for a nice change of pace. The two goat detectives lay side-by-side in the snow, furry faces perfectly blended into their cold surroundings. Above them was a clear night sky, endless canopy of stars twinkling brightly as if they were no further than an arm's reach away. No matter how breathtaking the Wishing Room underground looked, nothing could recreate the crisp, open air and the smell of freshly fallen rain.

A white streak of light entered the sky from behind their field of view and flew toward Equilibria's blocky outline.

"Look. Make a wish."

"Slow down there, fluffybutt."

The shooting star stopped and landed on one of the city's rooftops.

"Seems we aren't the only stargazers tonight. Maybe, when this is all over, we can take them to see one up close. Get them fitted for special sunglasses and everything."

"It'll be over soon at this rate. If Ellie's recollections are accurate, I think we just _lost_ one of our kidnapping-manslaughters."

"We tried our best; the evidence just had something else to say. These things happen. You take the first watch; keep the humans away and make sure those kids get home before midnight."

"Hey! Who said you get to sleep first?"

'Z' was already halfway into a catnap, one which no amount of poking or snowballs would interrupt.


	39. Patience

The goat detectives stared at a sketch depicting a young boy with short, black hair tucked behind a red bandana and a slightly older girl with a red ribbon pinned to her long hair.

"And you two fell down together?"

 _"Yes. We were all camping in those plains at the bottom of the mountains—they're really beautiful in the summertime, when the grass is as fresh and green as it'll ever get."_

 _"Mom and Dad were busy putting up the tent, and they let us go play around the mountain as long as we didn't wander off the trails. We've gone on camping trips before; we knew how to be safe. Anyway, one of the paths led us to this big, deep cave. We had to look around, of course. How many times do you get to see a real cave in your life?"_

 _"After about half an hour, our flashlight started flickering. I just wanted to see a little further in, and I know I should have gone back to get new batteries, but…I tripped…and fell, I guess."_

 _"I used up the last of the juice in the flashlight and found the hole my sister fell into. I called out into the chasm and waited three seconds for the echoes to stop, but I didn't hear her answer."_

"Wait. Jack, Anna, you two are related?"

The orange SOUL and the light blue SOUL did the incorporeal equivalent of hugging each other and nodding.

"Did you go in after her?"

 _"What else was I supposed to do?! She wasn't answering and it could have been too late if I went for help! I couldn't just leave her there, so I took a big breath in and…jumped. I landed in a patch of golden flowers and started looking around for her, but then this big goat lady came running out of nowhere!"_

'Z' pointed at Toriel and mouthed, "Her?"

Nobody needed to answer.

* * *

 _"Aah! Monster!"_

 _"Wait, child, did you fall down too? Are you hurt?"_

 _"Stay back! Or I…I'll punch you!"_

 _I swung with my glove as hard as I could, but I missed and lost my balance and fell over. I looked up and she was just standing over me with a confused look on her face._

 _"Wait, I'm sorry! Please don't eat me!"_

 _"'Eat you?' Don't be silly! Monsters don't eat humans!"_

 _"But…but then…where's Anna? Where's my sis?"_

 _"She fell down a short while before you did. I can take you to her; she's sleeping in my house right now."_

* * *

 _"Um…Miss Toriel, I'm sorry about trying to, um…punch you. And for saying you ate Anna."_

"It's quite all right, dear. You were just trying to protect your sister, after all."

Luna seemed concerned. He pointed to his own head and whispered something to his partner. Assuming Anna wasn't nocturnal, it was a strange time for a nap in a stranger's home.

'Z' nodded and asked, "It took around ten minutes to walk from the flower bed to the house, correct? How was Anna when you two went to see her?"

* * *

 _"Hey…sis…are you awake?"_

 _Anna grumbled and shuffled around for a while and slowly propped herself up. For someone who just slept, she looked really, really tired, like she was going to fall backward any second. I took her by the hand to help her sit up, but then she said something weird._

 _"…who are you?"_

 _"It's me! Jack! Come on, Mom and Dad have the tent set up and they're waiting for us!"_

 _I tried to pull her out of bed, but then she said, "What tent? Where are we?"_

 _"Quit joking around, sis! We gotta go!"_

 _I finally got her up, but when she took her first step, she lost her balance and nearly fell over._

* * *

"Excuse me for interrupting, but I can't help but notice Anna hasn't had much to say. It's perfectly fine if you don't want to talk, but…Anna…do you _remember_ the things your brother's talking about?"

 _"Of course, I…I…no, I swear, I do! But…why…"_

"Anna?"

 _"I'm trying! I remember Miss Toriel's face…the bed…but…I don't know how to describe it; it's like I wasn't really there."_

Both goat detectives grew pale under their hides.

"Would you say that you felt…'foggy'? Like there was a cloud around your head?"

 _"Yeah! Just like that!_ "

Luna jotted something down and cross-referenced with a pile of other notes and sketches and diagrams.

"Anna…I'm no doctor, but I think you've suffered a head injury. When you fell down, the impact must have given you a rather nasty concussion. The tired feeling, the clumsy movements, the confusion…it couldn't be anything else."

His demeanor changed immediately. Questions started sounding like terse commands.

"This is important. All of you. I need you all to tell me _exactly_ what you did to Anna starting after she woke up."

 _"Well…Miss Toriel made me soup. Nice and warm inside and out."_

"It was a vegetable soup. I thought about baking my trademark butterscotch-cinnamon pie, but she was clearly ill and sweets wouldn't do. After she finished the bowl, she said she had a headache, so I went to the refrigerator with some cloth and made her an ice pack. I helped her hold the ice to her head with one paw and cast a healing spell with the other."

 _"The pain went away…a little…but it still hurt bad. It felt like someone was hitting me over and over again with a hammer."_

"There was no way I would let her leave in that condition. I told them they could stay the night if they wished, and we decided that was for the best."

 _"Miss Toriel tucked both of us in and read us a story. It was about this little girl who ran away from home and met a little monster, and they end up having a lot of crazy adventures with each other."_

"A story? That's a nice gesture. Did you sleep well, Anna?"

 _"For an hour, I think…I was thirsty and I wanted a glass of water, so I carefully got out of bed and started making my way toward the kitchen. My legs were still kind of shaky, so I had to balance myself on the bed frame as I walked. I got to the door and opened it by leaning on it, but then my head suddenly started hurting again. It was really bad this time; my whole body just seized up and I guess I slipped off the door, because there was a loud crash and I was on my hands and knees. I tried to get up, but my head…and everything was spinning so fast…"_

"Please, _please_ tell me that someone found you."

"We both heard the noise and rushed into the hallway as fast as we could. Anna was slumped over by the wall and there was a pool of vomit next to her. I tried to check her, but she…she wouldn't wake…"

Thousand-yard stare, sweaty palms, and blood pounding in his head, the goat detective looked ready to be sick himself.

"Emesis…unconsciousness…this isn't a concussion, it's a brain hematoma! Quick! We need to reduce the pressure! Get a diuretic and an anesthetic and the nearest surgical team!"

Luna was now standing before the table and staring at the seated others in disbelief.

"What's wrong with you people? Go and get help!"

'Z' pulled her partner back into his seat and calmly reminded him, "Um…Luna. We're interviewing the human SOULs, remember?"

"Oh. Well…that's…embarrassing. I think I need some air."

(Using SOUL-SOUL tethering to talk means we'll _feel_ everything as they feel. I swear, these children will be the end of me…)

Luna got up again and showed himself out without a second glance, leaving the other to finish taking the victims' statements.

"Sometimes I wonder what goes on inside that head of his; anyway, you and Jack must have known that Anna needed a doctor. We all know healing magic can only do so much, after all."

"There is a clinic in Snowdin Town I used to take Chara and Asriel to. It wasn't a hospital, but they were very good. It was the best chance Anna had."

 _"We wrapped a blanket around Anna and carried her down the stairs and out the door, and it was snowing outside! I didn't even know it could snow underground! Only problem was…it was ice cold and I didn't have a jacket because it was the middle of summer. Miss Toriel told me to go back into the house and wait while she took Anna there herself. She gave me a spare key for the door, so I took it and warmed myself up beside the fireplace."_

"The cold never bothered me, so I tried to shield Anna from the wind as I moved along the snow. Some of the royal guards began to give me strange looks after I passed the wooden barricade, and I tried to hide Anna's face so they would not see, but a few still recognized I was carrying a human. I was still the queen; they would never question my intentions with Anna and one guard even congratulated me for catching a human by myself. I hurried her into the clinic, firmly reminded the doctor of their oath, and immediately returned to the Ruins."

 _"It was a little weird when Miss Toriel came back. For the first few minutes, we didn't say anything to each other. I curled up in a blanket by the fire and she went to the kitchen. We were both just trying our hardest not to think about Anna because worrying meant there was a chance she wouldn't make it. I heard the oven turn on and smelled something baking, and then Miss Toriel sat down in her chair with a book. She asked me if I wanted to hear a snail fact. Apparently, snail tongues are like chainsaws."_

"It must have been difficult waiting there, not knowing if your sister would be okay."

 _"Darn right. We went through all 72 uses for snails, which was about 71 more uses than I knew about. I think that was the longest, slowest hour of my life ever. I heard a ding, and Miss Toriel went to take the pie out of the oven."_

"Just butterscotch pie. Three plates and three slices set out on the table; two for us and one for Anna when the doctor brought her back. I read that some humans could have an adverse reaction to cinnamon, and I knew Anna's health was already fragile."

 _"And then, somebody knocked on the door. The doctor was there, but they were alone. They said they did all they could, but…Anna…"_

* * *

 _"What do you mean she 'didn't make it'?!"_

 _"I'm sorry. We couldn't get the pressure down quickly enough. She's gone. If it's any consolation, she wasn't in any pain when she passed, and at least her last waking memories were with you two_ _comforting her."_

 _"At least let me see her. You gotta, doc, I'm her brother!"_

 _"Son…I don't think that's a good idea. The royal guard arrived at my doorstep moments after the operation and took her to the castle. Furthermore, I've heard they're looking for humans to catch. For your own safety, I must recommend you stay with the queen until King Asgore comes to his senses."_

 _"I don't care if they took Anna halfway to the Moon! I'm gonna see her!"_

 _"I must insist, young one, you could be risking your life if the royal guard spots you. Go back into the Ruins with her Highness. Not all of my colleagues agree with the king's plan; the moment it's safe, someone will be here to notify you."_

 _"Forget that!"_

* * *

 _"And I just shoved the two of them aside and took off running toward the wooden fence. I didn't care if anyone saw me."_

"I started running and calling after him, but I just was not as fast as I once was. A few moments after he entered Snowdin Town, I lost sight of him. All I could do was go back to the Ruins. I sat down in my chair again and did nothing else but stare at the wall, cursing myself for failing Anna and letting Jack run off into a dangerous world so easily. Then, I realized: my phone! I still had my phone! Maybe it was not too late; I could call Asgore and try once more to convince him to spare this child's life."

"It was too late. A minute before her call, a guard delivered an orange SOUL to New Home. At no other time had Tori ever sounded so angry with me."

"From then on, I committed myself to keeping any human that fell down safe and out of your reach, even if it meant sheltering them in the Ruins until you gave up on your scheme. I only wanted to remind you of our own children, Gorey; if they were the only two you saw all day, perhaps you would see how this was hurting them."

Rockefeller held a smug smile across her face.

"I get it, Rocky, we'll drop another of those Man Ones, but don't think we're giving up on Jack's so easily. Hey, Luna, you're already outside; get off your neurotic butt and find us a cause of death."

* * *

Luna hung up and found himself at a Snowdin bar's doorstep. Through the warm orange light shining from the window and the greasy smells of fried food wafting through the door, everyone inside was chowing down on burgers and fries, drinking merrily, and generally having a good time. At a round table tucked beside the bar's counter, a pack of armored canine monsters was tossing chips and cards around. Resting on the floor were their weapons, an assortment of professionally crafted steel battleaxes and swords.

A few of the town's residents had tipped him off regarding the Guard's favorite hangout after more than light coaxing and prodding. If the king's recollection was correct, the last monster to have seen Jack alive was currently winning the shirt off someone's back. The goat detective dug a badge out of his pockets and started to open the door, but stopped and examined the shield in his paw. They wouldn't respond like typical subjects. The guardsmonsters were trusted law enforcement well-liked by everyone in town, and yet, they were sitting on the wrong side of the interrogation room. The door creaked open, and muffled footsteps made their way over to the poker table.

Word of the extraterrestrial intruders spread quickly. The canines held their cards close to themselves and glared icy glares over the edge of the plastic. Luna could have sworn that his sensitive ears picked up a low growl from the one in a ninja mask.

"We got a game goin' here, whadaya want?"

Luna presented the sketch of Jack and Anna as if they were a pair of aces.

"Him. More specifically, who caught him, where they caught him, and what they did to him."

"Who?"

"Jack. You know, the orange SOUL you took to Asgore?"

"Never heard of 'em."

The other bar patrons had turned in their seats. It was a full house and somebody was itching for a fight. He wasn't concerned; a flare shot to the first monster would buy him time to slip into the snow outside.

"Let me jog your memory, then. We have him and his sister at New Home, and they've already been through too much. Now, Jack wants to know who snatched his big sis's body and Anna wants to know who hunted down her grieving little brother. I don't want to have to return to them without a name."

"We didn't see nuthin', we didn't hear nuthin', and we don't know nuthin'."

"The royal guard I've been told about would never turn away a chance to help someone. Come on, they're kids and we're trying to help them too. Can't you spare a little professional courtesy?

"Look. King Asgore's our boss and our friend. He's a big fluffy pushover, and he cares about us like we're his own family. You can't expect us to trust you over him when you're holin' up his wife and kid in their own house like a prison cell."

* * *

'Z' nodded and hung up her phone. Visibly frustrated, she wiped her face with a paw and stepped away from the table. Luna returned a moment later with two plastic baggies in his paws.

"Stonewalled?"

"The guardsmonsters were less than cooperative, but could we really blame them? We may not even need them, anyway. I rooted around in the trash and found a worn boxing glove and a drawn-on red bandana. Sound familiar?"

 _"Heck yeah, they're mine!"_

"You'll get them back soon, but more importantly, their location proves someone tried to dispose of evidence and suggests whatever happened to Jack almost certainly happened in Snowdin. We won't know for sure until we find the body."

"Good for you, Fluffy Two, but don't forget; the maximum is six counts Man One and Kidnapping One according to the deal we've made. You can't stick any obstruction charges or go back up to Murder One as long as we're cooperating."

"Whatever."

 _"Did you, um…happen to find a red ribbon too?"_

"No…sorry. I'll go back and look tomorrow."

 _"It's okay, I guess I don't really need it anymore."_

'Z' found herself reaching for her left ear.

* * *

Red Ribbon +1 DF

*Completely ordinary piece of cloth usually worn on the head.

*May cause enemies to underestimate you.

* * *

 _"Oh, you don't have to—"_

"I have a couple of these. Here. In case you ever forget who you used to be."

 _"Thank you. I really appreciate it."_

The goat detective carefully placed the ribbon into Asriel's paws.

* * *

Another crisp night, only, instead of a clear sky, a thin layer of clouds obscured the stars. A light snow was falling, but cold breezes and ice crystals hardly bothered the two insulated monsters.

"I could really get used to this, Luna. Soft at first and hardens when you lie on top of it until it's just right."

"You said it. Really makes you wonder why, of all options, they chose to live in a sweaty volcanic cauldron."

"Fire resistance?"

"Yes, but still…perhaps we should hold the next round of questioning in a more temperate locale."

"What's the matter? Heat too much for you?"

"You can't help but overhear the voices of the town with these ridiculous things. Monsters have been…concerned about our treatment of the royal family. Some of them suspect us of some less-than-legitimate digging methods."

"But, that's not the case! The lawyer would have skinned us the very second she noticed coercion!"

"It doesn't matter. Minds wander and mouths move, and they'll be grumbling for no less than a full acquittal. However, if we could convince the mouths to sing _our_ tunes…"

"Fine. Let them choose the place for their own interrogation. Show the villagers the mercy cooperating will earn them. Now, if you don't mind…"

"Night—hey! Why do I get the first shift again?"

Luna weighed a lump of snow in his paw and tossed it at the back of his partner's head. Without getting up, 'Z' snapped her fingers and enveloped herself with a dome-shaped shield spell, which, to the other's resignation, proved effective at blocking unwanted snowballs.

* * *

"Air-conditioned. Not bad."

Another "tea party" at Alphys's laboratory, this time with the Dreemurr family occupying the sofa and the two goat detectives sitting across the coffee table and tea set in ergonomic, wheeled office chairs. Renovations on the far wall had been finished, unfortunate lunar hole replaced with a coat of fresh zucchini-green paint. The doctor herself was busy tidying up the kitchen area while Gaster kept himself buried in his latest round of experiments.

"So…I guess I'll be the um…quiet and out-of-the-way 'witness' here. I can post a little something on Undernet at the end of the day and everyone will know by tomorrow."

"Sounds good. Now, we haven't many more questions for Anna, and by now, aiming for a medical malpractice charge is pointless. We _would_ like to figure out what happened to Jack after he ran off, though. It's a lot of ground to cover starting from the Ruins door, so better to get started now."

'Z' took one half of a sip.

"Do you remember running into Waterfall, the place where the rocks and rivers alike glow blue?"

 _"We've been there with the prince pretty often, but by myself…no."_

'Z' took another quarter of a sip.

"How about Snowdin Town? See any snow-covered wooden buildings?"

 _"I mean, I wouldn't call them buildings; they were more like shacks. The kind you would sell lemonade out of."_

(Snowdin Forest it is, then. Blizz and Cryo are going to have a field day in the cold, aren't they?)

"Only one biome that fits your description. Do you remember anything else? Smells? Sounds?"

 _"Dogs. Barking and clanking. I think it started after I passed one of the stands. They were practically snapping at my ankles, but all that armor must have weighed them down and I got away."_

Luna looked annoyed. He stood up from his seat, sighed, and headed for the doorway.

"Those mutts! I knew it! I'm going right back down there myself to have a 'word' with them!"

'Z' stood up, grabbed his arm, and tugged him back to his chair.

"Slow down there. Let's get all the facts we can first. Why chase at their tails when we can bury them? Jack, if we showed you pictures of the guardsmonsters, do you think you could pick out which ones were pursuing you?"

 _"Worth a try."_

The goat detective motioned at Alphys, who dug up two dozen profiles of various canine monsters and displayed them on the monitor like a collage. In lieu of pointing with fingers he didn't have, the orange SOUL identified his attackers by floating in front of individual pictures and telepathically pulsing once. In all, the child recalled eight monsters.

 _"Did I get 'em?"_

"Um…yes. You did great."

 _"All right!"_

(Luna, a few of the monsters he identified were known to be stationed in Hotland at the time, and one was a fake photo of a monster I had the doc slip in. Our victim is pointing the non-finger at someone who doesn't actually exist. His memory isn't sharp enough to be admissible, I'm afraid.)

There was a loud blip from the computer, and on the monitor appeared a yellow Saturn-like outline with an exclamation mark in its spherical body. The icon could have won a half-second of interest from the spacefaring detectives, but it was unhelpfully obscuring the array of pictures.

"Please, doctor. We have important business to settle here."

"Sorry! It's just a news notification I get from GNN every now and then."

Then again, the array had already proven useless and curiosities were still being piqued.

"What's happening?"

"I'll click on this icon and a feed from their station should appear…now."

* * *

 _"—large congregation directly outside the Mount Ebott region."_

 _"That's right. Our correspondent has confirmed that the wave of protests following the verdict awarding monsters custody of two human children has spread to the monsters' own doorstep. Let's go live now."_

 _"As you can see behind me, the crowd is up to hundreds strong and energy levels are just through the roof. Excuse me, ma'am, would you like to tell our viewers why you've come out today? Do you oppose the jury's decision?"_

 _"Murder is murder. I think the jurors made the right choice to convict back there. But…sending those two kids away with the monsters? We have adoption agencies. Foster parents. Advocacy groups and plenty of people willing to help the Tellers' children. Who knows; the king and queen could be great parents but the jury might have played their hand too fast. There's been…rumors about those two."_

 _"Rumors?"_

 _"Some people are saying that there's been a big old cover-up down there. People are saying that they kidnapped and executed a bunch of human children and sacrificed their souls to reach the surface."_

 _"And do you personally believe these rumors?"_

 _"It's a terrible thing to believe. I don't want to judge them without seeing it for myself, but…there's not a lot of transparency here when they're holed up underground and not letting anybody in. A couple people want the king to start giving us answers."_

* * *

'Z' coughed and choked on her latest sip of tea, leading her partner to pat her heartily on her back until she caught her breath. Behind the reporter and interviewee was a sea of protesters at least double the size of the group that besieged the courtroom, heads and banners wrapping from the camera and news van all the way to the eastern forests. As before, several picket signs demanded that human children belong with human families, but an alarming proportion were beginning to demand "blood for blood" and "dust for dust."

"How…did…they…find…out? We told all of you: not a word to anyone outside the investigation! It was _you_ , wasn't it? Attorney's office not paying you as well as a hot tip?"

"No, Fluffy, I swear! I wouldn't even think of doing that with you helping me!"

"Then who?"

"Mom…what's going to happen to us? Are they going to take us away?"

As if he could sense his sister's distress, Anta stuck his head in from a side room, waving a wrench around and reassuring, "No way, sis, I'll keep you safe and I got a butt-kicking robot to prove it!"

"It'll be mass chaos if they push their way down here. There is nothing more important right now than dispersing them before somebody's hurt. Your Highness, we'll finish the questioning at a better time. You're all free to go; do anything you need to maintain the peace."

The king reached around in his robes and produced a cell phone.

"I'll ask the Royal Guard to construct sentry stations around both entrances and then join me in meeting the humans. Tori, why don't you stay here with the kids?"

"You can't go out there, Gorey! They'll tear you to shreds!"

The queen realized her paws were clutching Asgore's arm a little too tightly and loosened her grip. Luna hastily started counting on his eight fingers.

"We want to help if it means both of you can stay out of harm's way. If our crew joins forces with the guardsmonsters, we may have the numbers to disperse them. What do you think?"

"Interesting plan…but why place yourself in the same debacle you're trying to keep them out of? The weather report says it's rather chilly today, so let's sit and wait and hold the line until the horde scatters by itself. Blizz and Cryo are superb marksmen and mountaineers; I could have them nest above the snow line and track anyone wandering a bit too close for comfort, and a cloaked Carrier can support them within an hour."

Alphys dusted off a keyboard with a single stroke.

"Gaster and I got the last of the cameras back online yesterday. If anyone gets past the gatekeepers, I'll see them coming on this console. Plus, we're still tuned into GNN's feed, so we can see them outside from an angle the snow goats don't have."

"And I know a few judges who could be willing to sign an injunction. If the cold snap isn't convincing enough, a court order might help push them in the right direction."

"Great. Let's everyone do what they do best and see how the protesters respond."


	40. Bravery

_"Now back to our GNN Special Report: Mount Ebott Mayhem."_

 _"The standoff with the Monster Kingdom is now entering Hour Nine, and despite the nippy weather, neither side shows any sign of backing off soon. We still haven't had any word from the monsters, and protestors are now beginning to build campfires and barbecue pits to stave off the cold of the approaching nightfall. Wait—actually, I've just been informed that our station is receiving a transmission from under the mountain itself! It says…"_

 _"All demonstrating humans, be advised: you are currently trespassing in the territory of the Monster Kingdom. We will make no effort to disperse so long as your assembly remains peaceful and we are willing to continue communications with GNN serving as a messenger. We will answer questions you may have should they be submitted to the news network. However, be warned that anyone crossing within fifty metres of either cavern entrance without proper authorization will be pursued by armed guards. This measure is for our subjects', and therefore your own safety."_

* * *

Asgore lifted his thick paw from a microphone and backed away. Luna pointed at the computers and requested a copy of the transmission for himself.

"Will that suffice?"

"Nicely, and you're a king; of course, it would. We gave them what they wanted plus a nonconfrontational channel for their concerns. Hopefully, the dark will bring them to their senses and they'll go home to write us letters instead."

"What if they use the dark to sneak in? What if they hurt us in our sleep, and we can't do anything to stop them?"

Chara still looked worried. She remembered her nightmares all too vividly.

"Then we'll stand guard outside _ourselves_. If you start hearing explosions and thunderclaps, lock the doors and call Dr. Alphys."

* * *

 _"We're now approaching Hour 26 of the demonstrations outside Mount Ebott, and GNN has begun to receive the first wave of messages from beneath the mountain. Regarding the issue of Chara's parents, the monsters have reaffirmed their support for the court's decision and further requested that we stop pressing the topic. As for the rumors, the monsters have confirmed that 'difficult choices' were needed to shatter the barrier and that 'key individuals' are already being investigated for potential 'foul play,' but offered no further comment. You there, are you satisfied with the monsters' reply?"_

 _"Heck, no! They call that an answer, but all I heard was a load of canned, filtered, bureaucratic garbage! If they really don't have anything to hide, then why won't this king come out and face us?"_

 _"Do you think—wait…I'm getting word that Central is getting another message right this second. It says, 'Human, we haven't forgotten the First District Court Riot. Only a fool would go before a horde of that size and hostility a second time.'"_

 _"They're watching us right now, aren't they? Hey! You monsters tell your king that he can't hide behind his crown! The people deserve to know the truth and our kids deserve justice!"_

 _"Another message; it says, 'Again, our investigation is still in progress. When it's finished, we will make all the details publicly available. We're willing to do this whether or not our home is being besieged, and in fact, our investigators may be able to work faster without outside pressure.' After hearing that, will your people consider packing up?"_

 _"What, and give them more time to destroy evidence and think up a story? We need the truth right now, and we'll find it ourselves if we have to."_

* * *

Every Dreemurr sat huddled in front of Alphys's giant television while the doctor herself and the goat detectives manned the computer console. By linking to and employing the cloaked Carrier's electronics as a selective radio repeater, they devised a secure method of relaying messages to Global News Network's central station without attracting unwanted frequencies.

Even though the questions were technically coming from the reporter's mouth, the protester they were interviewing made it a point to stay facing the camera throughout their fifteen minutes. Every word he said, backed by a scowl and a shaking fist, was meant for one specific band of viewers.

"Fabricating evidence? Us? How dare they! How should we respond?"

"Obviously not by devolving into a shouting match. M.B. is better than that and we can't risk annoying them further. Any ideas, your Highness?"

Asgore sighed, pensively scratching the thick beard under his chin.

"It may be time indeed to, as they worded it, 'come out and face them'."

Several pairs of hands and paws latched onto his thick arms.

"No—"

"Dad—"

"You can't!"

"Just a little more time, your Highness. The panel of judges emailed me; it said it already started reviewing my request for an injunction."

"'Finding it ourselves' has only one possible meaning. They are threatening my subjects and my family. If I meet them outside, I may stop them before they overrun our home. Perhaps they can still be reasoned with; if not, your big, strong dad can handle anything they throw at me."

Luna folded his arms and blocked the doorway.

"I really must ask you to reconsider; in our professional opinion—"

"This is something I _must_ do. When you have children of your own, perhaps you will understand."

The kid card got him. Victims hardly counted.

"We could still disperse them by force. It's messy, but it's still an option!"

"I would think _you_ of all monsters would understand the value of choosing the battlefield."

The other goat detective fell silent for a brief moment, finger left hanging in the air like an unripe comeback.

"…fine. That's your choice. We'll follow you topside and stay close, but that isn't your choice."

The last drop of hesitation gripped at his ankles, but the king eventually made his way out of the lab. Luna and Zephyr marched directly behind him as if they were palace guards; these circumstances were familiar territory for them. It was a strangely quiet walk across Hotland punctuated only by bubbling magma, but at least the resident monsters were doing their best to stay calm. Some of the sentry stations were unoccupied, but as they approached the mouth of the cave, the remaining wooden bunkers housed doublets and triplets of guards all shooting the same disapproving glare or avoiding eye contact entirely. The goat detectives simply walked faster to evade a beatdown by looks, stopping just before the final station specifically built to overlook the winding trail leading up the mountain.

What he expected to be a guard post was a pile of wood scraps rather than an actual structure. Whoever oversaw this checkpoint didn't even bother sweeping up the sawdust scattered about the rocky floor. The base appeared roughly circular, suggesting that the guard plopped down the massive pile all at once instead of building up a lopsided heap piece by chucked piece. There was perhaps one other monster physically strong enough to accomplish such a feat, but she would have placed much more care into constructing a proper station. As much as he hated to admit it, the only other possibility was a powerful telekinetic.

Luna's blood froze in his veins. Reclining at the top of the pile was a short skeleton in a blue coat, slowly stirring awake in the trio's presence. He braced for anything—piercing calcified missiles, toxic death rays, or perhaps a random, blunt whack to the head, but Sans just gave a hearty yawn and sat up on the wood.

"so you _can_ sleep like a log on a log. who knew? mornin', asgore, something got your goat?"

"Hello, Sans. I have decided to meet and talk with the humans on the surface. I may be able to convince them to leave."

"uh, you sure? don't get me wrong, i respect that kinda backbone, but…wait…did those two put you up to this?"

Sans's eye and hand glowed a bright shade of teal. Luna thrashed with his leg and felt a worrying lack of solid ground blowing between his toes.

"why don't you try 'lightening up' once in a while? kicking back for a day never hurt anyone."

"Wait! It was his own idea! I'm not forcing him to do this! I swear!"

"Put him down! I'm the only one who gets to mess with him!"

'Z' had her usual bow drawn and a charged arrow loaded. The grip around her partner's body vanished, sending him crashing into the base of the pile.

"So, you must be Sans the Skeleton. You live with your brother in a house in Snowdin, which is also where you work as a royal guardsman. Coincidentally, you also hold posts in Waterfall and Hotland at the same time, which is possible owing to your mastery of teleportation and convenient because Captain Undyne has to give you three times as many breaks. You possess exceptional magical abilities, including telekinesis, which are apparently too much for him to handle. I found your application while pawing through the Canine Unit's file. Did I miss anything?"

"heh, bullseye. you're zephyr, but most of the space goats just call you 'z.' you spent the last year or so working a desk job until that lawyer and your partner roped you down here. you like using lightning magic, which means your partner ends most days looking like a fluffy pincushion."

"Hmm. Have you been spying on us too?"

"just keepin' an eye-socket out around the neighborhood. lookin' out for things that _don't belong_."

'Z' tossed the bow straight upward, folding her arms as the magical weapon vanished into thin air. Neither of them would ever dare try anything in front of Asgore, but she felt confident against a sudden laser blast.

"Convincing you to trust us will take more time than either of us have right now."

"you think?"

"It's us against them. We deal with the riff-raff outside first and we'll decide what happens later. I'll even let you pick on Luna a little after I go back to ZY-9."

(Hey!)

"throw in a bottle of ketchup. grillby won't let me have any more until i take care of my tab."

"Um…sure? Deal?"

(Is 'ketchup' a code word or…)

Luna shrugged.

"okay, so here's a plan. you guys don't need someone pulling you by the horns, so you go out there and do whatever you were already going to do. what i'm gonna do? i gave myself the most important job, of course: i'll 'supervise' from up here."

The troop of goat monsters nodded and started past the guard 'station,' beginning the winding trek down the face of the mountain. GNN forecasts were correct; a blast of cold air greeted their insulated faces the second they stepped into the sunlight.

"Wait. Did we just agree to let him lazy out of this mess?"

"If there is one thing I have learned in the many years I have known Sans, it is that he always knows exactly what he is doing. He has my complete trust."

"Pinpoint and instantaneous teleportation…he does seem to know whenever something goes wrong, and it's not like he can't get down here to assist us in a heartbeat. My crew should be meeting with the guards at the base of the peak soon, and your bunch is posted in the snow, right?"

'Z' nodded. A direct adaptation from their frigid origins, Boss Monsters were nearly invisible when lying down in snow. Blizz and Cryo were fully aware of their advantage, of course, and they had respectively cuddled around a modified telescope and a pair of binoculars. The trio they were watching over continued descending the mountain at a calm pace; reading their gestures, they seemed to be reviewing an emergency procedure that would inevitably end with shots taken. Asgore and company hadn't reached the end of the trail yet, but they were nearing the end of the section obscured by forest. There would be no turning back once the protesters spotted them.

The scopes turned south, eyeing and evaluating the faces camped down below. Even though there was a variety—men, women, young, old—none in particular screamed "unhinged lunatic" or "calculating assassin." Some of them even had children in their arms, bundled five and ten layers thick against the chilly wind.

Cryo set down the binoculars and rubbed their eyes. Thousands of details to sift through, and missing even one could prove fatal for their allies.

* * *

'Z' stopped and held her paw to her left ear.

"You're sure? Well, did both of you see it? Could it be anything else? Okay, I'll tell him."

"Is something the matter?"

"That was Cryo. They spotted an unusual metallic glint coming from somebody's waist, but they didn't get a good look at the object or the person's face before they mixed into the crowd again."

"Could it be one of those 'smart phones' that the humans find so popular?"

"…no."

"Do you believe that this person would want to harm me? Even after we sent them a message promising to come out?"

"Don't know, don't care. Your Highness, we should head back inside now. The other agents will try to find this would-be shooter and you can have your Q&A when we know it's safe."

The goat detective took Asgore by the arm and started escorting him back the way they came, but Luna seemed fixated on the edge of the forest.

"There _is_ another way…we _could_ give them something else to shoot at. The other guards and M.B. have already gone through the trouble of coming down here, so why not let them have the Q &A they want?"

"Um…because the king is in danger? What are you saying?"

Luna smirked.

"A _decoy_. Our good King Fluffybuns happens to be running late, so he sends another monster to fill in until he gets here. Our mystery assassin grows confused—it's only a matter of time before the veil of the crowd fails them. They get antsy—maybe they start sweating in three-degree weather because they start smelling goat bacon. Either way, they'll try to leave the scene and guards will spot them the moment they try. As for who the decoy will be…I think that's obvious. What do you think?"

'Z' and Asgore looked at each other, and then back at Luna, who didn't even blink once while laying out his scheme.

"A fine jest to remove our minds from these terrible thoughts…though I must admit I find your sense of humor a little terrifying."

Luna shook his head. Asgore's forced smile slid off his face.

"Wanna know what I think? _I_ think you've breathed in too much volcano gas!"

"The gunman is here _now_ , and we may never have another chance to catch them. Do you want them to come after the king when we aren't around to protect him?"

"We can worry about the future later! We need to worry about our safety now!"

"It's okay. Asgore will be safe and sound back at the lab."

"Safe and sound."

"Yes."

"Asgore."

"Mm-hmm."

Zephyr grabbed Luna by the shoulders, shaking him a bit and telepathically shouting, "You always do this! Just because we're in the business of helping people doesn't mean you can't help yourself every now and then!"

(I know…but…we shouldn't have to keep hiding every time our neighbors get a little too pushy and shovy. We can change things around this time. We'll make a stand. Show them that monsters aren't scared _or_ scary. Just one more move, 'Z'—)

(Have you forgotten that this one move of yours is setting out your own neck for target practice? At close range? Shield spells won't work against bullets and Blizz and Cryo won't get a clear shot with this many people around. If you can't dodge this one…)

(I will. Trust me.)

(No. You know what? It doesn't matter if you can because you won't. You're coming back to the lab with us and you're going to sit there until the cold drives them away.)

(Zephyr…)

(I'm serious, Luna! Don't think I won't stun you and drag you there myself if I have to!)

'Z' loosened her grip one finger at a time, fully expecting her partner to bolt down the path the second she let him go, but he just stood there, unmoving and staring into her eyes with a curious expression.

"Excuse me…commanders?"

"Yes?"

"Perhaps we could split the difference. There is no honor in going back upon our promises and I am perfectly willing to speak to the humans without a decoy. If, heaven forbid, a gun is fired, better to have it discharged outside."

The king only seemed more resolute in his desire to confront the humans now than before they ventured into the sunlight. Luna glanced at the golden light reflecting off Asgore's epaulettes; his stature certainly made him look durable, and both had utmost confidence in their contingent of guards holding the line below. Plus, the mob had managed to restrain itself thus far.

It had been a tense couple of days. Maybe 'Z's spotters had seen nothing more than overactive nerves.

* * *

"Here we are."

No flashy introduction. No rolling red carpet and rose baskets billowing in the wind. Not even a proper podium for the king of monsterkind, whose feet were resting on a weather-toughened tree stump. Various guardsmonsters stood behind him with arms lowered.

"My name is Asgore Dreemurr. As a goodwill gesture, I would like to help put some of your minds at ease. Please, ask away."

"Your Highness! Your Highness! The rumors about the fallen children—are they true?"

The clamoring reporters certainly didn't pull any punches. Every word would have to be chosen as carefully as if they were steps through a minefield.

"Yes. Over the span of a few years, six human children fell into our subterranean domain. When they perished, their SOULs lent us much of the energy required to undo the barrier."

The mere existence of the angels was public knowledge, easily discoverable with five minutes in the librarby. As for the mechanisms governing the barrier, the monsters had too few answers to comprise much of an information leak in the first place.

"Were you the one who killed them? Any comment on the investigation against you?"

It was only a matter of time. He hesitated, but offering no comment would be suicidal. Remembering the final piece of advice Rockefeller had given him, the king replied, "At first, I told the investigators that I killed all six children. That was the only way for me to shield my wife and children from suspicion, and, perhaps, the only way I could accept my terrible role in all of this. Regardless of the details, the truth is that I am no less responsible for their deaths than if I killed them all myself."

Somebody began pushing their way to the front of the crowd. The guardsmonsters nearly tripped over themselves rushing to the king's side.

"You're a soul-stealer! A devil!"

"How dare you to talk to His Highness that way!"

A glint of metal appeared at the periphery of multiple monsters' eyesight. It came not from the shouting agitator's pocket, but from a belt a few rows behind him. Pair by pair, each of the guards' eyes widened as neurons fired and reflexes triggered, lingering fears condensing into a single implied command. Luna readied a haphazard amount of magical energy into his paws and dived toward the king as a bang rippled through the crowd. He lacked the constitution to physically shove the titan of a Boss Monster more than a few feet and would rather not risk sending him into a tree by excessive telekinetics, but breathed just a little easier when he heard something impact the rocks with a dull thud.

"Luna! Get moving!"

"Yeah, punk! We'll handle this! Just get 'em home!"

No time to wait around for the other shots to announce themselves. The two of them waved in acknowledgement and sprinted for the path to subterranean safety, catching a glimpse of his partner and the armored guard captain leading a charge into the people scattering in all directions.

Keeping pace with the lieutenant by his left, Asgore listened to him pant, "Okay…just have to…open…worm—gaagh!"

The voice turned into a nasty, fleshy, tearing sound and a handful of red droplets. A searing pain, more than enough to lose him his footing, shot through Luna's shoulder, but before he tripped onto the floor, he felt a pair of paws hoist him into a fireman's carry. Without even slowing down, the king kept striding forward and soon bumped into a bluish flash of light.

"heya, kid goat…the next time you feel like headbutting a bullet… _don't_ , all right?"

"Sans! Am I glad to see you! We must head to a doctor at once."

"you got it. grab on."

Asgore secured Luna with one paw and took a bony hand with the other. Sans snapped his fingers and, with a whooshing sound and a sudden change in pressure, they reappeared outside Snowdin's clinic.

* * *

Once the skirmish above ground had cleared, Undyne and 'Z' wasted no time in discovering the whereabouts of their missing confederates. Their first instinct was to visit New Home and ask Toriel for help locating her husband, but king and lieutenant were both sitting around the dining room table, nonchalantly sipping tea.

"What took you two so long?"

'Z' took a deep breath and stomped toward her partner, who looked far too comfortable for his own good.

"Hey, is everything all right—"

A white blur flew toward Luna's muzzle.

"That's for talking us into going down there!"

(And for making me worry…)

Luna's paw shot toward his mouth as he recoiled, one-half covering the spot 'Z's finger poked and one-half suppressing a startled bleat. Asgore was doing something similar and yet different, holding Undyne's gauntlet-covered hand and sharing thoughts about how proud he felt of her ever since the first time she picked up a spear.

"What even happened down there, dear? Did they listen?"

"One of the humans began causing a disturbance, screaming and shouting the usual unpleasantries. But, before we could decide how to handle them, another one drew a pistol and…tried to shoot me. Emphasis on 'tried.'"

Two of the Dreemurr children leaned forward out of their seats, supporting themselves with their elbows against the table.

"Dad…!"

Asgore grinned.

"It happened quickly, but we were quicker. Something not to try at home, kids."

Luna scratched at the patch of gauze covering his shoulder. The rounded tip of his left ear was wrapped like a burrito.

"Not quick enough…grazed a little bit. We made a mistake thinking they worked alone. At least it's safe for now."

"They turned tail the second we brought out steel. Hah! Bunch of cowards!"


	41. Justice

_"—Mount Ebott now reeling from an assassination attempt on the king of the monsters himself, with the would-be assassin in stable condition at Equilibria General—"_

* * *

Toriel muted Alphys's television with a button press. Enough was enough.

"Hopefully this will be the last time a problem like this arises. Monsters do _not_ need to beg sympathy from pity and _you_ do not need to scare me like that again."

"Yes, honey. You were right, honey."

They shared a snicker and a grin.

"Somehow the things you boys were up to does not surprise me; now, could you fill us in on what happened after?"

Undyne pulled 'Z' out of her chair, carried her protesting and squirming self over her shoulder like a log, and set her down at the opposite side of the lab.

"Didn't really have to do much, to be honest. The noise made them start running in all directions, so we chased after them to make sure they didn't start moving toward the mountain. You kinda hung back about _this_ far and did your own thing."

The captain rewound the news footage, capturing a shaky close-up of the goat monster closing her eyes, raising both her paws to her sides, and murmuring an indistinct incantation. Two small sparks shot upward from her open palms and vanished. One second later, an overloading flash followed by a muffled thunderclap filled and jolted the right half of the screen.

"Personal preference."

Asriel counted to between five and eight on his fingers and whispered into Chara's ear.

"Why is zapping people your personal preference?"

"Oh, like you three don't do strange things. That guy will be fine, though. Five mils plus or minus a quarter never killed anyone, but they'll really be sore tomorrow. Though I thought I saw a pack of something white fly after them from higher up the mountain. Hmm, probably just nerves."

* * *

"Speaking of people who will be sore tomorrow…how's your ear? And your shoulder? Does your sorry tail count as one or two casualties in the incident report?"

This time, Luna and Zephyr had pitched camp under Waterfall's false canopy of stars. An obvious, stuffy downgrade from the open-air mountainside, the Wishing Room felt cramped by comparison but admittedly felt cozy, in the way that a sheltered, sturdy-on-all-sides nest probably felt to baby birds. The rhythmic pitter-pattering of dripping water would have helped, had it not also sounded like three mischievous sets of footsteps. The deciding factor, however, was the limitless not-hotel-quality-but-okayish warm running water without the limitless MTT price tag. 'Z', typing on the usual cell phone, had fashioned a crude chair out of some blue dirt and limestone while, behind her, Luna was trying an impromptu waterfall shower.

Talking over the tumbling falls, the soggy goat monster answered, " _One_ casualty. Let's not double the embarrassment here."

"Yeah, whatever. Next section…'enemy casualties'…one assassin, _cuit saignant_."

"Only the one fried guy?"

'Z' stretched and tossed and turned in the chair, feet now dangling over the headrest and droopy ears floating barely above the ground.

"Mm-hmm."

"Nice."

Luna stuck a paw out of the water-curtain for a high five, but when Zephyr's hanging foot failed to respond, he settled for poking the unguarded sole with his claws.

"Hey!"

Either ticklish or just surprised, 'Z' jerked back and slid off the chair.

"Great, you're up. You _really_ need to try these falls; there's something about the water and it's the most refreshing shower I've ever had."

* * *

 _"My name's Hunter, ma'am."_

Air conditioning? Check. Tea? Check. Well-rested humans and monsters? More or less.

"Hunter, you must have known that this place was dangerous after news of Anna and Jack's disappearance spread. Why did you come here?"

 _"Well…it was those two. See, my daddy's precinct got the job of investigating 'round these parts. Thought I could help him wind up this business."_

Luna studied the floating yellow heart before him, picturing himself going on and on about how the overeager junior deputy acted irresponsibly before deciding to keep his own mouth shut. Still, he had stared just long enough for Hunter to notice.

 _"Dad's a real ace-high sheriff, but the big suits have been buzzin' round his ears over this case and he always came home looking so tired. I just wanted to show 'em I could help. What would he think if only he could see me now?"_

"Hmm—"

"Your father would be proud!" 'Z' shouted, words coming out a little more loudly than she expected and suddenly enough to make the other goat operative flinch.

"What—"

"Yes…proud. Absolutely, totally, unconditionally, and unequivocally proud. The Mount Ebott Disappearances are still open, after all, and you're here helping us—him—solve them. You haven't failed yet, have you?"

 _"Why, no ma'am, I guess not."_

(I get it, fluffybutt…)

(Good.)

"Just like the other times, Hunter, we need to start by finding clues. Do you remember what you brought with you to the mountain?"

 _"Let's see…I had my vest, boots, my favorite hat…a good ol' fashioned rope…and of course, my daddy's six-shooter. Used the rope to climb down the hole from those Ruins over yonder, but I guess I didn't hitch it quite right, because it kinda fell down with me."_

"Wait. A revolver? For goodness sakes, why do humans have to—mmph!"

"What she meant to say was that we're having trouble understanding why you believed you needed to bring a weapon here."

(Can you _not_ do that? Your paw tastes like dirt.)

(You smell like dirt. Shoulda tried the falls when you had the chance.)

(Do not!)

 _"This clearly ain't a bone orchard y'all live in. Your lord and ladyship know how to make a cave look good. But for all we knew, there coulda been a real bad guy behind all this."_

"Fair enough."

A quiet little hand raised itself from the right side of the table.

"Frisk? You know where it is?"

"Yeah. Found it a while ago. Should I get it?"

"Only if it's empty. Otherwise, come back here straight away."

The eighth human discreetly opened the door and left the facility, last glimpse of her indicating she was walking toward New Home.

(Luna, why does it seem like our day's getting longer and longer?)

(Don't ask me; I'm still stuck on how _Frisk_ got her hands on such a thing. Chara, maybe, but that little angel?)

About 12 minutes later, the glass door slid open. Every pair of eyes searched for Frisk's hand and the weapon it may or may not have contained. Most of them were unsettled by the silvery glint under the fingers and then relieved upon realizing that the gun was empty. If it was unloaded now, then it was probably unloaded since Frisk first found it. After all, there was a better chance of diamonds falling from the sky than Frisk finding the correct caliber bullets and then loading it herself. Frisk could also have found it loaded and either unloaded or used it herself, but nobody seemed to want to consider those possibilities.

However, the odds were that Hunter had remembered the obvious task of loading the revolver he was clearly comfortable enough with to hinge his life on. If it was unloaded now, then up to six rounds could have been fired underground.

And now everyone was a little on edge again.

"Um…guys? You're staring. I found the six-shooter; it's right here—"

"Whoa! Watch where you point that thing!"

Frisk definitely found it unloaded.

A clear novice to firearms, Frisk held the pistol in a natural way: three fingers around the grip, thumb on top of the middle finger, and index resting against the trigger. When she raised it up to show the others, the lawyer and goat detectives instinctively ducked out of their chairs. Toriel and Asgore followed suit soon after. Luna scampered toward Frisk, removed the revolver from her hand, and carefully set it down on the table.

"My child! When were you going to tell us what you found?"

"Goodness sakes, Frisk…okay, Rule Number One: these things are loaded until you prove they aren't. How do you open this?"

 _"There's a release latch there on the side, Tex."_

The goat monster fumbled around with the weapon for a while, slightly intrigued when the cylinder swung out of its housing. It was unquestionably empty, but a few of the chambers were marked with dried black residue.

"Rule Number Two: never point these near anybody unless you're looking to kill somebody—no, actually, we're holding on to this until you get a concealed carrying thing. What would any of you even need it for?"

 _"Aww, don't get your back up over this. That's an antique, one of those family heirloom whatchamacallits!"_

Luna inhaled and sighed the biggest sigh of his life. He plucked the gun from the table by the barrel, other hand's fingers pointing at it like punctuation marks.

"…you will not use this as one of your props for Humans and Monsters. You will not wave this around to try and impress the other monster kids. And if I find this loaded before you have a permit, I'll ask your mother to do something."

The kids nodded.

"Excellent…now, we have a different problem. Look at the chambers here, and someone's clearly fired this thing without wiping it clean. Be honest now, Hunter, is Frisk a secret sharpshooter or was it you who tried getting in some target practice?"

"…"

"Come on, kid. Like a bandage."

After a few more coaxing stares, the yellow SOUL curtly responded, _"I ain't a murderer!"_

"No one's saying you are. But, it sounds like there is something you'd like to tell us. A mishap, perhaps?"

 _"It's a real long story, but I swear, on my daddy's honor, that I never beefed anybody in my life. Like I said, I dropped down into the Ruins all ninja-like with the rope. That old line fell in right after me, so I reckoned I'd take a look-see; round up those two and find another way out. I didn't see any of you monsters right away, but golly, was that cave purple. Looked like y'all decided to have a food fight with only eggplants and grape juice. Guess I wasn't as quiet as I thought, because I heard this voice, fine as cream gravy, ask, 'Who is there?'"_

* * *

 _"I can hear you. Have you fallen down too? Stay there; don't move."_

 _Well, what else was I supposed to do? I poked my head out around the corner and saw this lady's shadow ambling toward me, sniffing around and calling out for people who took the two-armed airway._

 _"Right here and right as rain, ma'am; how do you…you…whoa! What kinda hay-eater are you?"_

 _For all y'all goatiness, your shadows aren't like other crittters'._

 _"I am Toriel, caretaker of the Ruins. Hmm, you do not look like the others…"_

 _"Says you! You 'do not look like', well…anything!"_

 _"I am a monster."_

 _"You're talking!"_

 _"No, I am Toriel."_

 _And then the boiler started chugging again. I heard the community gospel, too. Had an inkling why I brought along, well, you know, but you weren't exactly trying to make supper out of my leg._

 _"Ha ha…all right then, Miss Toriel. Have you seen these two kids come 'round these parts?"_

 _"Yes, um…they went this way. The path leads past my house; would you like something to eat?"_

 _"I could bend an elbow myself."_

* * *

 _"I didn't think your face could turn any whiter under that hide, but that picture really sent your blood up the hills."_

"Forgive me for lying to you, but surely now, you must understand why I did."

* * *

 _We walked. Talked. Still didn't catch hide nor tail of anyone else. Eventually, we ended up in front of this big old brick house._

 _"Real nice digs you got here. Someone like you couldn't be living by your lonesome with all this, right?"_

 _"Oh, goodness, you're a smooth talker; it almost feels like I am speaking with an old friend. But, no, it is just me. I haven't many visitors down here, and certainly not humans."_

 _The bedrooms sent me a little up the creek though. One of them—the one Toriel let me hit the hay in—had an overflowing chest of toys. There was a hearty mix of girls' and boys' doodads—all of them handmade—and that didn't make a lick of sense with what she was saying. I was already yawning like a lion though, so I figured I'd ask tomorrow. Just in case, I slept with an eye peeled._

 _"Good morning, my child. Did you sleep well?"_

 _"'My child'? What in tarnation…I mean, like a bug on a rug. There was something that kept bugging the brain, though. You said you lived here alone, but what's the story behind the toy box?"_

 _Maybe that was the wrong question. Toriel's face turned all sullen, like I won the prize for fastest way to ruin mornings. She just mumbled 'I need some time alone' and half-strolled, half-ran downstairs._

* * *

 _"I want y'all to know that I ain't real proud about what happened next. I thought it wouldn't be very gentlemanly if I didn't try to make amends, so I followed Toriel down into the basement. Only, it was more like a long tunnel, and she was at the end poking around a door one-and-a-half times her size, I reckon."_

* * *

 _"Miss? Are you down here?"_

 _"Child? Were you worried about me? Oh, how gracious of you, but please, go back upstairs. I will be joining you shortly."_

 _I turned away and started back up the stairs, but then I turned around and started as softly as I could._

 _"Listen…I should have been more thoughtful about what I said earlier. The toys, the room…you once had a son and daughter, didn't you? I didn't mean to dig 'em up again if you've been trying to move on."_

 _"Yes, you are right, I suppose…"_

 _"Do you believe in fate? Only reason I ended up here was to look for a son and daughter; you know, those two kids what came 'round here a while ago. Still, they've been away from home for a long time now; their mom and dad's hearts must be aching something fierce."_

 _"…please. Leave me be. Your breakfast is upstairs."_

 _"Okay…but, I gotta ask: do you need help with that door? You've been starin' at it like a five-legged cow for a while now."_

 _I figured it had gotten jammed and she was trying to open it again, so I walked up and tried to help push it open. Soon as my hand touched the stone, she grabbed my wrist and yanked me away. Surprising strength, too, I ended up hind-end on the floor from that._

* * *

 _"For the one second you had me…I'll tell ya, you really put new meaning behind 'fire in your eyes'. Then you let go all of a sudden and covered your muzzle with that same paw."_

"I was horrified by what I had done. The day Asriel was born, I swore I'd never raise an arm against a child like that. No matter how difficult being a parent could become; no matter how exhausted I would feel from being awoken by a midnight cry—"

"Mom…! Not in front of the others—"

Toriel simply kissed her son on the ear, rubbed the back of his fluffy head, and carried on.

"I would _never_ become one of _those_ parents."

* * *

 _"Ouch…you marryin' that door or what?"_

 _After she stopped practicing her living statue impression, she came toward me, apologizing and waving around a green light in her paws. Maybe it was my sore backside, or Toriel trying to push away my questions, or just the whole topsy-turviness of it all, but something clicked in the back of my mind. Next thing I knew, I was standing and had my six-shooter out._

 _"Back off!"_

 _"My child! Put that down!"_

 _And wouldn't you believe it, she was coming straight towards me like a bull ready to charge! Like she didn't know what these things were! I just kept pacing back, trying to keep my arm from trembling too much._

 _"'My child! My child!' Why do you keep calling me that?"_

 _"Because I know what's best for you!"_

 _It was a long hallway, but I looked over my shoulder and I was runnin' out of hallway. I started shouting my head off; nothing else looked like it was working, and they say you're supposed to scare off bears that way. Not that Toriel reminds me of a bear._

 _"You know what? I know you're hidin' something from me! I bet you know exactly what happened to Anna and Jack, and I bet it has something to do with that door you're awful protective of!"_

 _"You don't understand! Those two, they're…"_

 _"They're what?"_

 _"They're dead…they…Asgore…he took them…"_

 _My mouth just stopped moving, like it stopped listening to my brain; I felt my arm raising and…bang!_

* * *

"Wait. You shot at my mom? Really?"

 _"I said I wasn't real proud of this, Prince Goat. It was just a warning shot and I saw something crack and ping all the way down the hallway. Besides, your mom duck-and-covered almost immediately, and I didn't see any blood, so I kinda stepped around her and skedaddled out the doorway."_

"It felt as though somebody taped two alarm clocks under my ears. I couldn't stand, I couldn't call after Hunter; the sharp noise paralyzed me. I remember being curled up on the floor, rubbing my head…just pleading for the ringing to stop."

Zephyr was still furiously tapping notes into her phone; Luna had been nodding without a single word for the last fifteen seconds, as if checking items off an invisible list of symptoms for 'Shot-In-The-Face' syndrome.

(Wonder what the lawyer's thinking…)

Luna glanced towards Rockefeller's seat. Instead of the expected human with notepad, there was a sticky note attached to the table.

* * *

Answering phone call

Will return in five minutes

If not, "Self-defense"

* * *

"…okay then. That's the end of that."

The goat detectives summoned the image of a stereotypical cowboy, poring over the image's outfit.

"I suppose you didn't bring your winter wear, either."

 _"I had a vest. Long-sleeved shirt. Whenever the wind picked up, I tried to cover my face with my hat. Getting down to brass tacks, though, how did y'all even make it snow?"_

Impossible weather probably belonged in Alphys's wheelhouse.

"It's, um…pretty cool, actually. Some monsters tend to give off heat while others absorb it from their surroundings. There's a lot of both living between Snowdin and Hotland, and their magic ended up creating a constant heat current. As for why Snowdin's cold and not the other way around, well…it just so happened that the monsters who first decided to live there were mostly the endothermic types. After a thousand years or so, the heat flow got stuck that way. But why Snowdin snows? Um…you sort of know how the CORE works, right? It's a geothermal generator—Waterfall water comes in, Hotland turns it into steam, steam gets piped to Snowdin, Snowdin precipitates it as, well, snow, and the water trickles back into Waterfall."

"Impressive! I hope you don't mind if we try to buy the idea from you; it nearly puts our asteroids to shame. Give us a few weeks. Our labs must have something they'd like to trade. Anyway, Hunter, how did you deal with the cold?"

" _I set my sights on a town ten thousand paces away. Trotting my way down the path, I heard something howl. Didn't matter much to me whether y'all had dogs or were dogs, but I will admit their baying made my heart do a cartwheel or two. It kinda reminded me of those K-9 units they use to sniff out outlaws. And then, all at once, it hit me. Shooting at people tends not to be legal where I came from. I was the outlaw they were hunting. Stalking, like a juicy calf fallen behind the rest of the herd. Any second now, the barks would get louder. I'd hear footsteps circling me like a net, I'd struggle to see their owners as they weaved through the woods, and then, all at once, they'd leap out and…take me to monster jail? I knew they wouldn't eat me, and I couldn't imagine what else they'd do."_

 _"I ducked into the forest and half-crawled, half-tiptoed through the snow. I tried my darndest to cover my tracks, but then came the shuffling sounds I prayed to hear anything but. He was a strange pup; shifty eyes peeking out from under a black ninja scarf. I slowly placed my hand over the holster, ready to draw, but then he said, 'Buddy. Path's that way.'"_

 _"By some fashion of fortune, he didn't recognize me! I'm not sure if he even knew I was someone to be on the lookout for! Still, I reckon I must've looked mighty suspicious sneaking around the trees. He had a short sword in each paw, and his manner made it clear I'd either walk out or be dragged out. Something was off, though—he wasn't eyeing me as much as he was staring down the tree to my right. It really got weird when he started brushing the trunk with his sword, telling the tree to move along like he was directing traffic."_

"I see…you must have run into one of our Royal Guard, ah...Doggo. He has a condition that makes it difficult for him to see stationary things, but he is extraordinary at tracking moving objects. I know it seems like he would not make a good royal guardsmonster, but the other guards take care of him; keep him from bumping into buildings and such, and he gets very excited whenever he _does_ find something to chase. You can always tell when somebody has found the perfect job for themselves and…you didn't hurt him, did you?"

 _"I had to do the quick math before he figured out I wasn't a conversational conifer. The town wasn't too far away, but Doggo would spot me the second I took off running. Moving like molasses, I quietly undid the strap and raised the revolver toward the sky, trying to keep my arm as stiff as, well, that tree. Judging by what happened to Goat Mom over there, I figured the shot would scare him off long enough for me to blend into the townsfolk. Even if Doggo's friends started chasing after me, I could hide the gun and make like I was running away from the same thing that spooked Doggo. The trigger weighed as much as a horse under my trembling finger, but I shut my eyes, held my breath, and squeezed hard."_

 _"Doggo just skedaddled like in those cartoons, yelping and tripping over himself like a soft white tumbleweed. The bang must've carried a lot farther than I thought, because by the time I got to Snowdin, all the monsters there were already murmuring about a forest fire. Just like I planned, I started chatting up a couple of them about the noise. A few 'Did you hear that too's' and 'What do y'all think happened's' and they were none the wiser."_

"At this point, I started receiving calls by the dozens, all of them about a mystery explosion in Snowdin Forest. The Guard could not pinpoint the cause or the exact location, but they assured me no one was injured. And then, much to my surprise, your mother called."

Right then, Asgore's phone buzzed. Heads shifted. Toriel's paws were empty; so were the kids'. One check of the call history later, he knew it wasn't a well (or poorly) timed joke.

"Hmm…an email? On the official address? Excuse me, but I must attend to this."

"Well, sure; it's important business after all. What's happening now?"

The king's brow furrowed like a mountain ridge, fingers just a little too large for the buttons but still pinching and zooming around the screen.

"It's Mr. Teller. He says he wants to see Chara and Anta."

"What could that vile man want with our children? Does he not have a restraining order?"

"He does, but depending on how badly he wants to see them, it won't be much of a deterrent. I shouldn't bad-mouth my employers, but restraining order punishments are contempt punishments. He'd probably get another fine and a light scolding."

"But he would also be trespassing, correct? It would be within our right to have the Guard chase him off."

"Wait, Tori, there is more to the email. He says he also wants to apologize in person for the various inconveniences he has caused us."

"Tori" shot him a "There's only one right answer and your next words better be it" raised eyebrow.

"Um…Not that it changes anything, of course. They called you some very distasteful things that night. But, before I speak for all of us…does anyone still want to meet with Mr. Teller?"

"Heck, no!"

"Not if Chara doesn't."

"I needed an icepack. For my muzzle."

"Then it is agreed. After we are done here, I will ask him to deliver his apologies in writing only. Now, as I said, Tori called me shortly after the gunshot rang out in Snowdin Forest."

* * *

 _"Hello?"_

 _"Asgore?"_

 _"Tori? Oh, how sweet it is to hear your voice after the things that've transpired today! Does this mean you forgive me?"_

 _"No."_

* * *

The queen of the monsters earned herself a gaggle of raised eyebrows.

"What? I wasn't ready to forgive him— _especially_ not after he took Anna and Jack's SOULs. I do not believe it was such an unreasonable choice at the time!"

Everyone kind of shifted backward into their seats and pretended not to have been staring.

"But…I had to warn you, even if it meant getting your hopes up. I told you all about how a third human had fallen down; how he possessed a strange weapon empowered by fiery magic and almost perfectly designed to slay Boss Monsters."

'Z' shot an accusing glare at the revolver resting at the center of the table, and then the yellow SOUL across from it.

"Hmph. Shield-piercing, wounding, and stunning all-in-one. You sure these really aren't special caprine-killers?"

"The 'fiery magic' was a hand gun. I recognized it immediately. How could I not after Asriel described it? Clearly, it was a danger for as long as it remained underground. I preferred not to imagine what could happen if a monster randomly surprised the human. Therefore, I instructed the Guard to not only avoid a direct confrontation, but to create a convenient, monster-free path leading away from Snowdin. It fell to Undyne to track Hunter through Waterfall, tossing the occasional spear from the shadows to 'convince' him to keep moving. After he made it out; well, it is quite evident that Hotland has its own 'persuasion methods,' so it wasn't long before he reached New Home."

 _"It was the fish lady? I was squaring off against the fish lady? I don't even think I spooked her!"_

"How many times did you fire?"

 _"Let's see…the first bright blue spear came rainin' down from a ledge up high, so I aimed for the pillar it came from and took off running soon as I heard the bang. The ground turned into a whole lot of rickety wooden platforms, so I had to slow down a little, but I figured she ran off like the others. But when I turned around, she was coming after me on that ledge like a runaway train! I could feel the bridges quake under my feet every time one of those spears landed—probably thought I would trip and fall off a hundred different times. At one point I honestly did turn around and try to beef her again, but how did y'all think that turned out? I swear, on my own grave: she's crazier than a bag of Kilkenny Cats."_

They had no need to seek confirmation. Undyne probably ran toward the gunshots.

 _"After what felt like an hour of mad dashing, the spears just kind of…stopped. I looked behind, and she was gone! She didn't seem like the ambushin' type, so I guess she got tired of chasing me. Problem is, she ain't the givin' up type either. I finally dug myself out of the caves, and in front of me was this enormous, bubbling lava ocean. Now it made sense; I wouldn't want to chase me through that kind of egg-frying heat either. Too bad I didn't have a choice. Up ahead were these square metal geysers which, I'll admit, were kinda fun to ride on, but I kept hearing this roaring below me. Not like a lion ringing the dinner bell, but whooshing like an airplane taking off."_

* * *

 _"Going so soon, darling? You haven't even done your big reprise yet!"_

 _I turn around, and high above my head was a flying…television set? Had gears and blinking lights and flames coming out its back; the whole kit and caboodle._

 _"I'm doing a reprise? What—"_

 _"Now, that's the spirit! Okay, in this scene, you've finally outrun the angry native—so helpfully and unwittingly depicted by Undyne—with the ancient treasure still in your pockets. You're almost home free now, but it turns out those natives still have a few tricks up their sleeves—"_

 _"Scene? Treasure? Start making sense!"_

 _"Darling, darling…don't tell me you're getting stage fright now. I know we've switched the set around last-minute because we couldn't fit the giant boulder into the budget, but the hat, the gun…you're as perfect for the part as you'll ever be."_

 _"Now see here, I never signed up for the silver screen! You gonna tell me where Anna and Jack are or—"_

 _"So sorry, dear, but we're on a tight schedule today. We can discuss your contract after we finish shooting. Now…lights! Camera! Action!"_

 _It raised its chrome hand into a finger gun pointed square at me and then…zap! Bit like a snake!_

 _"Cut! Cut! You're supposed to run away and dodge the lightning! Let's take it from the top—"_

 _"No! Not again!"_

 _I dug around my waist and wrapped my sweaty, shaking fingers around the gun. Shooting something living and breathing was one thing, but this time…it felt more like when I practiced on tin cans. He was kinda floating in one place, and before I knew it, I saw two sharp pings off its front screen._

 _"Well, well…don't you know that Alphys built this body to be indestructible? I didn't plan to kill off the co-star so early, but…audiences do love a twist."_

* * *

 _"Let's just describe everything else that happened between us as a showdown between a headless chicken and a motorized electric fence. Eventually, he flew away grumbling something about understudies and I ended up by Toriel's house again. Kinda. It looked like someone sun-dried the color out of the other one and plopped it down here."_

* * *

 _Dreemurr Family Residence. No points for creativity, I reckon. Gave a good knock on the door and somebody answered. We didn't say a word to each other at first. We didn't need to. Something about his somber face told me that I would not be finding Anna or Jack today or ever again._

 _"Howdy."_

 _"…howdy."_

 _"You must be the human my wife has been speaking about."_

 _"Ha ha…um…yeah."_

 _"I usually offer my guests tea, but…I did not expect you to arrive so soon and I hadn't any time to tidy up the place. You must have learned by now that the Barrier keeps us trapped underground; that we need seven SOULs to regain our freedom. SOULs…like yours."_

 _I felt something squeezing down on my chest, tightening around like a lasso, but, far as I was concerned, he didn't seem to be doing anything besides brushing the top of his shirt. I didn't really get the lingo about souls and barriers, but he clearly wanted something from me real bad, and it wasn't something I had in my pockets. Dad told me that every criminal does little things when they're nervous. Sometimes their eyes move a certain way, or their hands will go somewhere, but Asgore's right one kept coming back to where his heart should have been. My imagination started running a little too fast—did he want to rip out_ _my_ _heart? Stick me like a pig and use my blood for scary soul stuff? What about my other internal organs? And most importantly, what in tarnation did he do to the other two?_

* * *

"Ehrm…"

Asriel looked one-half disgusted and the rest horrified. The other SOULs were huddled behind his ears, doing the eyeless equivalent of staring.

 _"What? Y'all never seen any horror movies before?"_

* * *

 _I backed away as fast as I could, shouting, "Your guards couldn't keep up with me, and you can't either! I…I'll come back with my dad and his friends, and then you'll pay for those two!" Then, I ran down a hallway hoping it'd take me far, far away from the house. It kinda did, but the hallway emptied out into an enormous cavern, easily as tall and wide as a movie screen. My heart was racing, not only from the exercise, but because I could see moonlight shining through the other side. A few more steps, and I'd be free!_

 _I felt my legs wind up like springs, and then…nothing. I slammed face-first into a giant wall of nothing. That just wasn't fair. The light was so close; it smelled crisp, like pine trees, but the air somehow wouldn't let me go through!_

 _Heavy footsteps. My heart sank._

 _"You can't cross the Barrier either, at least not without absorbing a monster's SOUL."_

 _Maybe I was seeing things, but I could have sworn there was a white something fading in and out of Asgore's chest. This time, he had a big, red, mean-looking pitchfork, so I started wailing on the nothing with the gun like it was a club._

 _"No…you're…huff…a…liar!"_

 _"This is the truth, I'm afraid. Do not waste your strength banging on the Barrier like that. We have been trapped down here for a very long time and we need your SOUL to have any hope of escaping. I am sorry, human, but my people need me to do this."_

 _"Wait! Isn't there any other way? Can't you, um…dig around it or build a battering ram? What about wiring up a bomb?"_

 _"Those were among the first things we tried, and to no avail, as you can plainly see. To be honest, I…do not wish to do this either. I just put my children to bed, but you may leave if you want time to prepare. I will wait for you here at the same time tomorrow. By then, I promise I will have a cup of tea ready for you, if you want."_

 _"…no. I'm ready."_

 _"Okay. Like going to the dentist…it will be over before you know it. Do not hold anything back for this old goat; remember that you need my SOUL as dearly if you wish to leave."_

* * *

 _"That's all I got. What, you want a blow-by-blow?"_

"Um…no, that won't be necessary. But just to confirm: it was Asgore who killed you?"

 _"What do y'all think? If only I'd brought a pail of water, I woulda had him!"_

Indignation from losing aside, Hunter's last recollection may as well have splintered straight through the table. The king himself stared at his paws as if they were still caked in blood, and hearing his crimes read aloud again didn't help in the slightest. Frisk and accomplices brushed and poked at his arm, first to get his attention and then to comfort him.

"Sigh…do you all realize that this is among the things that will be made public at the end of the investigation?"

"But…wait…you can't just tell the humans that he murdered a child! Self-defense claim or not, it would be the death of human-monster relations!"

"Hiding it would only make sure that human-monster relations will never recover again. Besides, your husband already said he was 'as guilty as if he had done it himself' in that conference yesterday. It sounds bad, but does that detail really cede them something they don't already have?"

"Do _you_ remember what happened during that conference? Are you actually trying to get my husband killed again?"

"No!" Luna stammered, "No…of course not, because it's different this time. Don't you see? This time, the humans know better than to make foolish assassination attempts."

* * *

The sky was starless tonight, thick layer of clouds pouring down snow but chilly winds not quite reaching blizzard strength. On a whim, Luna and Zephyr had decided to revisit their earlier mountain burrows, opting instead for a single larger, deeper trench to better ward off the cold. It was a little too narrow to avoid the occasional elbow-face interface, but they eventually shifted into comfortable positions like two birds in a nest. One of their phones cast a soft glow upon the other's muzzle in a vain effort to catch up on paperwork.

"I think we should have stayed around a little longer. You don't just go into people's houses and, announce to the family that the dad killed somebody, and then paint a big red target on his back."

"The 'family' seems to have already accepted that fact. What does it matter if they hear it again? Luna, if they were going to fall apart under the pressure, it would have happened three SOULs ago."

"'Pressure'? Were you testing them?"

"We really did need to find out what transpired here. It's our jobs, after all, and we had promises to fulfill. But, I'll admit that I had certain curiosities about our recently discovered allies. I wanted to push them a little bit. Some people are pushed over; others push back."

"And what has your pushing spree shown you?"

"That yellow dinosaur made no mistake. They're caprines through and through. Even the ones who don't look like us. Even the two human-looking ones."

'Z's phone buzzed. Notification from a colleague, and urgent given the late hour.

"Avalanche warning?"

The goat monster replied "No." but somehow ended up looking more worried.

"Um…did you overhear which prison they sent Chara's biological mother to?"

"Hudson Bay Correctional. Something happen there?"

"There…oh, my."

"Snap out of the light-year stare for a second and let me see."

Both of them took turns scrolling, catching eyefuls of enough burnt buildings and collapsed walls to embarrass an earthquake. Paramedics in their teal, sooty scrubs were herding stretchers around heaps of stone chunks and chain-link fence fragments as if trying to build a cloth-and-metal snake.

"A riot broke out. The worst prison riot in human history. They're at fifty casualties and still counting. We're trying to get a list of names as quickly as we can."

"Any idea what they were fighting about?"

"Maybe a power struggle? Look at the bodies: a lot of them have the same pattern of black marks covering their arms."

"Theirs are pigment injections, right? But Chara's mother didn't strike me as the street gang type…no…do you think she might have gotten caught in the crossfire?"

"I'll ask someone to search for her first thing tomorrow."


	42. Integrity

"Good morning, your Highness, I'm glad you could join me here."

Luna, sitting on a rock under the Wishing Room's twinkling canopy, watched as a slightly groggy Asriel walked into the open chamber, splashed his own face with some cool water trickling past his feet, and waved through the fine mist.

"It took _a lot_ of convincing for your mother to let us do this, but given recent events—um…what exactly is that you're wearing? I suggested you bring something comfortable, but this may be a little too...literal."

Now close enough that the mist no longer obscured him, the now fully-awake goat prince let the goat commander take in his rainbow-striped elastic headband and star-embroidered wristbands. Luna couldn't help but snicker just out of audible range; however, to the prince's credit, the tank top, shorts, and enthusiastic face were sensible choices.

"Chara says this is what humans wear when they exercise."

"Not exactly a lie, I suppose. However, I didn't drag you out at this hour for an hour of mountain climbing."

Luna gestured toward a whiteboard, a small trampoline, and a bowling ball, all gathered in a rocky nook as if it was his cluttered garage.

"Like I said, I've had some concerns based on recent events topside. If you've watched the news, you've learned that the prison Chara's biological mother was sent to is currently a smoking crater. Our agents couldn't find Clairine's body, which means she's either super dead or figuring out her first day as a fugitive."

"Hunter says people on the run like to seek out friends and family."

"Exactly. Perhaps Clairine will search for her husband first, but inevitably, I think they _will_ come here. Restraining order or not, we should prepare."

The whiteboard and a thin, black marker came out of hiding. Asriel grinned ear-to-floppy-ear when his opposite finished writing and stepped aside.

* * *

 _"Wormholes and the Gravitational Field"_

* * *

"I suppose your mother had a good point. You'll survive many more fights fleeing by wormhole than through masterful sword skills. Since we have some time, let's start with some basic theory."

Luna walked over to the trampoline, bounced on it exactly once, and landed on the dirt beside it.

"Things fall when you let them go. Absolutely groundbreaking science here. But have you ever considered why?"

"Gravity, right?"

"Yes. But, what is gravity? It has no taste; no smell…you cannot touch or see it, but something is certainly connecting you and me to the Earth. Experiments have shown us several quantifiable properties of this strange connection; for example, that it gets stronger with heavier objects and weaker with increasing distance, so we know it's definitely there. Still following along?"

* * *

 _F = GMm r-2_

* * *

"Uh…sort of?"

"Hmm…let's try something more visual."

Luna plopped the bowling ball onto the trampoline, letting it roll into and create a funnel-like depression in the center of the elastic fabric.

"Wait, I think I've seen this before. So we can pretend that the gravitational field is like a curve in space, which makes smaller things like the Earth roll toward bigger things like the Sun?"

"I'll admit this model is a bit simplified, but yes. That's right. Every object generates a gravitational field around itself, which, if you look at the equation, depends on mass and distance. In other words, the 'hole' gets steeper the closer you get to the bowling ball, but heavier things like you…"

The bowling ball came off. Luna motioned for Asriel to take its place.

"…make steeper 'holes' to begin with."

Asriel's face showed an elation reserved for those who, like daybreak through the trees, understood something in complete clarity.

"But that's enough boring book learning. What if we had something so massive that the hole it made was infinitely steep?"

"Then F would be really big, which means nothing that fell in would ever get out…a black hole?"

"Yes. A true black hole is effectively a hole in the fabric of the universe. Not so useful for traveling, but a useful intermediate. But then, we have another problem. I'm clearly not infinitely massive, so how am I creating black holes like this one?"

Luna breathed in and snapped his fingers. A dark sphere appeared above his right paw. Luna snapped again and the sphere vanished.

* * *

 _F* = GM(E*) (cr)-2_

* * *

"As you and your fireballs know, magic can replicate many natural phenomena, including gravitational fields. Ask 'Z' about electric fields and she'll talk your ears off. By concentrating enough magical energy—the E-star—I can approximate the ones formed when stars go out."

"More math?"

"Um…no. No more. I promise. I'm afraid this is where our two-dimensional model fails us, but I want you to imagine: what if you created two black holes at once, bending the fabric of space in such a way that the two holes lead into the same place?"

"You'd get a funnel…no, an hourglass…wait…"

"Something like an hourglass, actually. More generally, you'd get a tunnel through space itself, connecting the two places where you formed the two holes. Make the tunnel big enough, and you can travel between the two places almost instantaneously. To demonstrate…"

A bright vortex appeared in front of Luna, slowly expanding until it was a head taller than him. Out of the corner of his eye, Asriel noticed a second vortex forming simultaneously on the other side of the Wishing Room. Peering into the closer vortex was disorienting—Asriel saw the same blue earth and twinkling rocks but blurry and at a strange angle.

"Wait, why isn't this one pitch-black?"

"Light can go through wormholes just like you or me; after all, it's really just a tunnel. An obscuring spell I use makes the others opaque—makes it harder to follow me—but maybe we'll save that for another day."

Luna closed the wormhole by lowering his paw. Panting, he continued, "Phew…now…there are some limitations. You have to open both ends at the same time, so you have to put in quite a bit. It costs energy and absolute focus to hold these open, so you have to keep putting in the longer you take. It gets harder the more space you have to bend, so you do have a maximum range. Even so, it's a very quick way to travel, and with experience, you can almost compete with true teleportation. Give me your paws."

Asriel stuck out his fluffy, white paws; from behind, the goat commander gently took his wrists and pointed them straight ahead. Speaking softly, he asked, "I want you to know how it feels before you try to make a wormhole yourself. One end will be in front of us. Do you have a destination in mind?"

"I do."

"Okay. I want you to visualize the space between here and your destination. Don't focus on the twists and turns you'd take on foot; instead, try a bird's eye view to really understand the relative orientation of these two points in three-dimensional space."

"Um…got it."

"Now, when you open it, you'll feel a very strong pinching sensation. Hyper Goner probably feels similar, but in your normal form you'll be feeling a lot more. It'll start at your fingers and toes and move towards your SOUL as if someone was sucking you through a straw. Don't worry; it won't hurt you, but you must remember to hold your breath until the wormhole is completely opened. Otherwise, the pressure will choke you, you'll end up coughing like you swallowed a pepper, and you'll most certainly lose your focus. On three, okay?"

"One…two…three!"

(Hold it…hold it…hold it…and…there!)

When the prince opened his eyes, he was face-to-face with a large sphere, edges glowing just like Luna's a few minutes ago. From the wormhole, he was able to make out a cloudy image of his home's living room, but from the raised perspective of an upper corner rather than a ground-level observer.

"Not bad. Places you're familiar with are the easiest to visualize. Unfortunately, I don't think you meant for it to drop you three meters in the air."

Asriel shrugged, but the moment he retracted his outstretched paw from the aperture, it wobbled like a hatching egg and went out with a startling bang.

"What was that?!"

"Easy there, everything's fine…like I said, you need to stay focused. What you just saw was the tunnel collapsing in on itself, followed by the gathered magical energy suddenly re-expanding. There is nothing physiologically 'wrong' with closing wormholes so quickly, but you'd clearly like to avoid scary noises. Let's try again. Same destination but try to get this one a little closer to the ground."

Once the prince's heart rate returned to double digits, Asriel and Luna raised their paws again; this time, the aperture captured the dining room table and chairs from an appropriate height. Chara and Frisk were busy playing a tabletop game; based on number of pieces alone, the latter had apparently gained a slight advantage. Frisk spoke inaudibly to Chara and pointed at their sudden spectator, leading both to get up off their seats and crowd around the space bubble. On the goat monsters' end, a muffled voice emerged, shouting, "Wha—Azzy? How?"

'Azzy', visibly straining, shouted back, "I…um…made a wormhole! Getting a little hard to keep it open now, so back up and let me try to close this thing…"

In a more controlled fashion than the first, the vortex shrank to the size of a marble and then evaporated into a cloud of white particles.

* * *

A lone, bow-wielding goat monster leaned over a wooden railing connected to one of Waterfall's many wooden bridges, ears being massaged by water trickling over the stones underneath. There were still a few magical arrows stuck in the far wall, vaporizing one by one and leaving small craters where they landed. It mattered not how slowly or quietly Rockefeller approached, as, without turning her head, 'Z' started, "So, do you still consider us dangerous 'living weapons'?"

The lawyer stopped dead in her tracks. Figured the goat would have heard someone coming despite the ambient sound.

"How did you know it was me?"

"I recognized your scent. Grit, sweat, and spearmint perfume."

"My…scent…?"

Rockefeller sniffed her jacket self-consciously.

"No. Few monsters wear shoes. Even fewer wear sneakers designed for human feet."

'Z' patted the railing twice. Two elbows joined hers by the riverside.

"Careful now…I could still bite!

One of them playfully brushed the other's shoulder.

"But you really do have a point. Magic can be scary if you lose control of it. I don't know how you feel about conscription, but we make _everyone_ join the military for about…eight, nine…ten months whenever they reach a certain age. It isn't about might or even patriotism; it's about making sure that everybody knows how to use magic safely. And we definitely wouldn't send the first-years into battle."

"I'll wager that doesn't apply to you."

"Luna and I are exempt, for obvious reasons. It'd be counterproductive."

"While I'm apparently on a hot streak, let me also wager that wasn't why you started doing intelligence."

'Z's head jerked back slightly.

"Why I started doing this…I guess you could say family tradition drew me in. No harm in giving it a shot, after all. I figured I'd follow through for a few months, but…turns out I have a knack for this, and now we're here."

"It's good, being happy with your profession. It means you can focus on things you enjoy."

"Oh…?"

Something about the lawyer's tone seemed a little off.

"Fluffy, you're no prosecutor. You don't need to pretend to be one. You've already too many things to focus on. By the time we reached Hunter's case, all it took was a note card for you to concede those charges. Be honest with me, Fluffy. Did you ever have any intention of pursuing the king, or were you putting up a fight for my sake?"

"…how long have you thought that?"

"I had an inkling when you announced Plain View Doctrine before searching his Highness's closet. Fluffy, no officer I have worked with has ever said those words specifically. It felt as though you had researched legal terms last-minute just to impress me. I knew beyond a doubt when that angry mob descended on the mountain and all you cared about was dispersing them before someone got hurt."

'Z' shook her head.

"We really did have to find out what transpired around the six children, and soon, we'll have a complete case file about them. It'll surely be an interesting read, but…do we dare share it with the humans? The subject is a grisly one. We could set back human-monster relationships by decades, which means the king and queen probably won't make any more progress with the UEG in their lifetimes. I'm not sure if a monster would even be able to walk down the street, honestly. What would inevitably happen? Another war? Another dust storm? But, if we hid it from the humans, we'd be complicit in arranging a cover-up. Our good name would suffer as much, considering how intensely we chewed out the UEG for covering up the Golden Flowers Incident. Plus, we'd be keeping five families from ever discovering the exact fate of their loved ones…"

"If you're expecting a suggestion from me, I think you'd already know where I stand."

"I hope we can handle fallout."

* * *

"Try it yourself."

The goat prince raised his paw forward and curled his fingers as though pumping up a blood pressure cuff in slow motion. As the squeezing wrapped around his wrists and forearms, iridescent particles materialized in the cool air and began collecting themselves into a magical sphere. The proto-vortex widened by a couple of centimeters per second as more magical energy coalesced, but Asriel felt pressure weighing increasingly against his chest. It was as if the energy _hated_ being forced into a confined space. It wanted to burst out of the prince's unqualified cage like a beast slamming against iron bars.

"…hnrrrk…kagh!"

Luna took a moment to fix the fur on his head, unstable detonation having blown it backward like a wind tunnel. He grabbed a bottle of water and set it down near an Asriel on his paws and knees, coughing and sputtering as if he too indulged in a bite of moldy pie.

"Can we…can…can…we…break?"

"Yes, of course. I assure you, these do get easier. It just takes practice."

* * *

"You got it as big as a beach ball before it blew up? Not bad. I think my first got just over...this dish, actually."

The training had obviously tuckered Asriel out, so the two agents accepted meeting the Dreemurrs for lunch at a fancier restaurant in Hotland. They still couldn't allow the king and queen to pay for their meals, but a few rent-free nights camping on the mountain during good weather and in Waterfall otherwise had saved them more than enough for some seared salmon with green onions. Toriel and Asgore had sprung for stuffed eggplants and a rib-eye steak, respectively, and their kids were slurping down three different pasta dishes.

"So, Rockefeller has probably informed you that we will not be trying to intimidate, search the property of, or otherwise hound his Highness for answers anymore. Believe me or not, but it isn't another trick this time. Turns out lawyers do not have unlimited vacation days, because she told me she'll be leaving soon, and she'd sleep better if we stopped doing that."

* * *

 _"Are you hurt? Child, let me see—"_

 _"Une_ _chèvre_ _parlante!"_

 _"…?"_

 _"Um…you are…talking goat, no?"_

* * *

A SOUL hovered over a candle set on the white tablecloth, drowning it in a deep blue light.

"Of course…it makes sense, considering the geography…um… _Marie, parlez-vous Français?"_

 _"Oui! But…it is maybe easier for other talking goats to continue this way?_

* * *

 _I was going home from the ballet competition when our car started making all manner of strange noises. The mechanic told us they would need some hours to drive out here, so we walked around your beautiful forest to pass time. But then, the sunlight stopped shining through the leaves and it started to rain. We would have returned to the car, but there was a cave nearby. The clouds outside made it difficult to see far, and then I tripped. I needed special shoes for the dance, but they were most certainly not made for walking in caves! When she found me, I was trying to remove my shoes before I tripped again. The fall did not hurt very much, but I cut my leg on some of the rocks._

 _When Madame Toriel touched it with her paw, I felt warm and cozy inside. And then, when she took her paw away, the cut was almost gone. I felt safe following her now, but I would have felt safe even if she was not a magic goat._

* * *

The waiter, a tall lizard-like monster, lifted away a silver dome to reveal a plate piled high with oozing, slimy snails. Luna and Zephyr tried not to turn their noses up too quickly while Chara and Frisk just kept smiling, glancing at the dish every so often to make sure the snails weren't actually moving. That concern hadn't stopped Asriel and his parents, who had each topped off their plates with a generous scoop.

Bowing to the pairs of expectant eyes, the two guests retrieved one snail each with chopsticks and slurped out the gooey contents with their mouths. Despite the…interesting texture, they were pleasantly surprised by a taste slightly resembling garlic-seasoned oysters.

* * *

 _"Sniff sniff…what is that lovely smell?"_

 _"Smell? Oh, it must be the snail pie I baked for myself this morning. I can make you something else to eat; what would you like?"_

 _"I like snails. Could we share the pie?"_

 _"Of course, dear."_

 _Toriel cut a big slimy piece for me. I think she was happy because she had someone to share the snails with._

 _"Do you like it?"_

 _"Mmph._ _C'est délicieux_ _."_

 _"Honestly, I did not know that humans eat snails, too. The other humans never seemed to have much of an appetite whenever I asked."_

 _"They are a favorite in the little town I come from. But did you say that other humans have fallen through the hole where I fell? Where are they?"_

* * *

"Perhaps it was an after-shock from the previous human, but for a reason I cannot describe, I decided to be completely and unsparingly honest with Marie. Sometimes children will do the exact opposite of what they are told, so I hoped my reversed approach would be more persuasive."

* * *

 _"You are not the first human to have fallen down here. There were five just like you, and they all passed through here. They searched for an escape route, but they could not find one. Now, four of them are dead."_

 _Toriel touched my heart with her paw. It was a deep blue that made me feel sadness, just like how she looked._

 _"They…King Asgore…wants human SOULs to destroy the barrier that keeps monsters trapped down here. If you leave, they…they'll take you away and…there is no way out while the barrier stands. Please…don't leave me. I can feed you, and keep you safe, and…"_

 _"Shh…it is okay. I will stay with you for a little time."_

 _That night, my curiosity got the better of me. I tiptoed down the stairs while she was fast asleep, and I nudged the door open. I saw so much snow outside; much too cold to wear my other clothes or a tutu and ballet shoes, and then I went back to bed. "Perhaps I am dreaming?" I thought, but I woke up tomorrow and found my tutu on the shelf exactly where I had put it._

 _Toriel made us goat—, um…oatmeal. It was okay. Healthy, but…I do not know how to describe it other than a very okay breakfast._

 _"Could you tell me about this 'King Asgore'? What is he like?"_

 _She went to the bookcase and removed a picture from a dusty old book. She was much younger in that picture, and she was nuzzling another just like her, but with much bigger horns._

 _"Asgore, um…is my husband."_

 _"Then you are…a queen? Oh, no! What has happened?"_

 _"I guess this is not the fairy tale you wanted to hear, but there was a time when our lives were almost like one—married, two kids…but one day, some humans nearly killed them. In his anger, he decreed that all humans who were found underground would have their SOULs taken away, until there were enough to destroy the barrier and kindle a war with the humans above ground."_

 _I tried to move my spoon toward the bowl, but I could not._

 _"He would not listen to me, he would not reconsider, and I could not recognize my children's loving father. But maybe, if I could keep humans away from him for long enough, he would come to his senses. Do you see now, Marie? I cannot let him see you for as long as he is foolishly chasing after SOULs."_

 _I tried to have a bite of the oatmeal, but I could not._

* * *

A royal guardsmonster came running in, armor plates clanging around them like a pile of tin cans.

"Your Highness. We've spotted Chara's biological father walking around the base of the mountain. He said he would like to talk to Chara and Anta about Clairine. What should we do?"

"Send him away. We want nothing more to do with him but tell him he may contact us through the official e-mail address if he so desires."

"May I follow you out? Promise I won't start round two when we get there."

The guard waved Luna to the door. Just before they disappeared, Asgore called out toward them, "Remember. You need only ask him to leave. If he refuses, we may discuss next moves then."

Asriel heard a faint whooshing that he quietly wished was his. Still, he was nowhere near giving up on his unconventional studies.

* * *

After checking over their shoulders enough times to guarantee they hadn't been followed by Dreemurr and Co., Luna and the guard stepped out of the shadow cast by the cave entrance, walking over a faint black ridge marking where the barrier had cut through the rocks. Waiting there was a man in a nice shirt and slacks, escorted by two other guards flanking behind him. Clairine was nowhere to be found.

"Good afternoon. I am afraid that the princess is unavailable to visitors today. Please come back later, or—here's a better idea— _don't._ Ever."

The goat reached into his pocket and flicked something yellow and shiny toward the man, who caught it, turned it over with his fingers, and, not knowing what to do with it, handed it to one of the guards.

"This gold coin should cover your gas bill."

"No hard feelings, right, Fluffy? Come on, you gotta let me see her. Haven't you watched the news lately? I need to talk to her about her mother."

"Those are things you may communicate in writing. Also, don't call me 'Fluffy'."

"Right. My bad. But I'm her father. You can't just hide my daughter away from me!"

"One court ruling says you aren't and one restraining order says we can."

"You know darn well that order's a crock, from the same court that sent your prince crying in the bathroom and tried to make a martyr out of your queen. Don't you think what's happened to her mother is more important than a piece of paper? What if _you_ take me to see Chara? Nothing can happen to her if you're watching my every move, right?"

"No!"

"Five minutes, and if at any point Chara wants me to leave, I'll leave without putting up a fight."

"This isn't something you can bargain over! Chara doesn't want to see you!"

"Really? Did Chara say that? Or is it just you putting words in her mouth?"

"Haven't you noticed that she didn't come up here with me? She's afraid of you!"

"Is she really hiding? Did you even let her know I came here? How do I know you lot didn't lock her up in a room somewhere?"

Luna's patience, rather scarce to begin with given the circumstances, had already skipped back into the cavern he emerged from minutes ago. After a curt goodbye and a "Have a pleasant day," his legs followed suit.

Out of the edge of his ear, he heard someone shout, "Unhand me; these legs aren't broken!" followed by someone grumbling, "Fantastic, even the monsters act like monsters."


End file.
